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V     \          . 

11 

^Mexico 


Historical  "Review 


Palace  of  the  Governors,  Santa  Fe 


KANSAS  CITY,  MO. 
PUBLIC  LIBRARY 

FEB  131961 


January,  1961 


Editors 
FRANK  D.  REEVE  PAUL  A.  F.  WALTER 

Associates 

PERCY  M.  BALDWIN  GEORGE  P.  HAMMOND 

FRANCE  V.  SCHOLES  ELEANOR  B.  ADAMS 

BRUCE  T.ELLIS 

VOL.  XXXVI JANUARY,  1961 No.  1 

CONTENTS 

Page 
The  Case  of  Major  Isaac  Lynde 

A.  F.  H.  Armstrong 1 

Fort  Union  and  the  Santa  Fe  Trail 

Robert  M.  Utley 36 

Solomon  Perry  Sublette :  Mountain  Man  of  the  Forties 

John   E.    Sunder 49 

Lew  Wallace's  Ben  Hur 

Jackson  E.  Towne 62 

Book  Reviews 70 

Notes  and  Documents  .  80 


THE  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW  is  published  jointly  by  the 
Historical  Society  of  New  Mexico  and  the  University  of  New  Mexico. 
Subscription  to  the  REVIEW  is  by  membership  in  the  Society — open  to  all. 
Dues,  including  subscription,  $5.00  annually,  in  advance.  Single  num- 
bers, except  a  few  which  have  become  scarce,  are  $1.00  each.  For  further 
information  regarding  back  files  and  other  publications  available,  see 
back  cover. 

Membership  dues  and  other  business  communications  should  be  ad- 
dressed to  the  Historical  Society  of  New  Mexico,  Box  1727,  Santa  Fe, 
N.  M.  Manuscripts  and  editorial  correspondence  should  be  addressed 
to  Prof.  Frank  D.  Reeve,  University  of  New  Mexico,  Albuquerque,  N.  M. 

Entered  as  second-class  matter  at  Santa  Fe,  New  Mexico 
PRINTED  AT  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  NEW  MEXICO,  ALBUQUERQUE 


Editors 
FRANK  D.  REEVE  PAUL  A.  F.  WALTER 

Associates 

PERCY  M.  BALDWIN  GEORGE  P.  HAMMOND 

FRANCE  V.  SCHOLES  ELEANOR  B.  ADAMS 

BRUCE  T.  ELLIS 


VOLUME  XXXVI 
1961 


PUBLISHED  QUARTERLY  BY  THE 

HISTORICAL  SOCIETY  OF  NEW  MEXICO 

AND 

THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  NEW  MEXICO 


NEW  MEXICO 
HISTORICAL  REVIEW 


CONTENTS 

Page 
BER  1,  JANUARY,  1961 

The  Case  of  Major  Isaac  Lynde 

A.  F.  H.  Armstrong         1 

Fort  Union  and  the  Santa  Fe  Trail 

Robert  M.Utley      36 

Solomon  Perry  Sublette :  Mountain  Man  of  the  Forties 

John  E.  Sunder      49 

Lew  Wallace's  Ben  Hur 

Jackson  E.  Towne       62 

Book  Reviews 70 

Notes  and  Documents 80 

NUMBER  2,  APRIL,  1961 

A  Ride  from  Geronimo,  The  Apache 

Nellie  Brown  Powers       89 

Pascual  Orozco :  Chihuahua  Rebel 

Paige  W.  Christiansen       97 

British  Investment  and  the  American  Mining  Frontier, 

1860-1914    .       .       ...       .       .     Clark  C.  Spence     121 

Frank  Bond:   Gentleman   Sheepherder  of  Northern 
New  Mexico  1883-1915  (continued) 

Frank  H.  Grubbs     138 


Page 

West  of  the  Pecos  (concluded) 

E.  L.  Steve  Stephens     159 

Notes  and  Documents 175 

Book  Reviews 176 

NUMBER  3,  JULY,  1961 

Edmund  G.  Ross  as  Governor  of  New  Mexico  Terri- 
tory; A  Reappraisal       .       .      Howard  R.  Lamar     177 

The  Presidio  Supply  Problem  of  New  Mexico  in  the 

Eighteenth  Century        .       .       Max  L.  Moorhead     210 

Frank  Bond:   Gentleman   Sheepherder  of  Northern 
New  Mexico,  1883-1915  (continued) 

Frank  H.  Grubbs     230 

Book  Reviews 244 

NUMBER  4,  OCTOBER,1961 

Paul  "Flying  Eagle"  Good  Bear 

LuellaThornburg    257 

The   Chouteau-Demun   Expedition   to    New   Mexico, 

1815-17 George  S.  Ulibarri     263 

Frank   Bond:    Gentleman  Sheepherder   of   Northern 
New  Mexico,  1883-1915  (continued) 

Frank  H.  Grubbs  274 
Notes  and  Documents 346 

Book  Reviews  349 


The  Historical  Society  of  New  Mexico 

Organized  December  26,  1859 


PAST  PRESIDENTS 
1859  —  COL.  JOHN  B.  GRAYSON,  U.  S.  A. 
1861  —  MAJ.  JAMES  L.  DONALDSON,  U.  S.  A. 
1863  —  HON.  KIRBY  BENEDICT 

adjourned  sine  die,  Sept.  S3,  1883 


re-established  Dee.  S7, 1880 

1881  —  HON.  WILLIAM  G.  RITCH 
1883  —  HON.  L.  BRADFORD  PRINCE 
1923  —  HON.  FRANK  W.  CLANCY 

1925  —  COL.  RALPH  E.  TWITCHELL 

1926  —  PAUL  A.  F.  WALTER 

OFFICERS  FOR  1959-60 
President,  CALVIN  HORN,  Albuquerque 
Vice-President,  ROBERT  UTLEY,  Santa  Fe 
Treasurer,  THOMAS  B.  CATRON  in,  Santa  Fe 
Recording  Secretary,  WILLIAM  S.  WALLACE,  Las  Vegas 
Corresponding  Secretary,  BRUCE  T.  ELLIS,  Santa  Fe 

FELLOWS 

PERCY  M.  BALDWIN  J.  LLOYD  MECHAM 

RALPH  P.  BIBBER  THEODOSIUS  MEYER,  O.F.M. 

HERBERT  0.  BRAYER  FRANK  D.  REEVE 

FRAY  ANGELICO  CHAVEZ  FRANCE  V.  SCHOLES 

REV.  STANLEY  CROCCHIOLA  ALFRED  B.  THOMAS 

CHARLES  E.  DIBBLE  THEODORE  TREUTHLEIN 

AURELIO  M.  ESPINOSA  PAUL  A.  F.  WALTER 

GEORGE  P.  HAMMOND 


VOL.  XXXVI  JANUARY,  1961  No.  1 

THE  CASE  OF  MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE 
By  A.  F.  H.  ARMSTRONG 

ON  January  27,  1861,  at  San  Augustine  Springs,  New 
Mexico  Territory,  Major  Isaac  Lynde,  7th  U.S.  Infan- 
try, surrendered  his  entire  command  to  an  inferior  force  of 
Confederate  troops  led  by  Lieutenant-Colonel  John  R.  Baylor, 
Mounted  Rifles,  C.S.A. 

Reports  filed  by  both  sides  at  the  time  agree  that  Lynde 
surrendered  to  an  inferior  force.  They  agree  on  the  date  and 
place.  They  disagree  somewhat  on  the  size  and  composition 
of  Lynde's  command  and  the  Confederate  command.  They 
disagree  widely  on  the  causes  for  Lynde's  surrender. 

I  propose  to  draw  on  all  the  material  that  contributes  to 
a  picture  of  Major  Lynde,  his  action  and  its  causes,  and  to 
arrange  this  into  a  cohesive  whole,  hoping  the  truth  may 
emerge  more  clearly  than  it  has  heretofore  without  such 
correlation.  My  primary  sources  are  the  official  military  cor- 
respondence related  to  Lynde's  surrender,  and  papers  con- 
cerning him  in  the  National  Archives  at  Washington. 
Secondary  sources  are  the  published  narratives  of  two  par- 
ticipants, the  published  remarks  of  a  civilian  observer,  and 
contemporary  accounts  from  a  local  newspaper.  In  working 
toward  a  true  perspective  on  Lynde's  surrender,  I  shall 
occasionally  note,  not  as  sources  but  merely  for  appraisal, 
the  remarks  of  various  historians  who  have  treated  this 
event  briefly  in  a  context  of  larger  happenings,  making  use 
of  no  primary  material  beyond  that  cited  here. 

The  general  military  situation  which  reached  a  crisis  in 
the  surrender  at  San  Augustine  Springs  appears  in  the  Army 


2  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

dispatches  of  the  Department  of  New  Mexico  during  the 
early  months  of  1861. 

Colonel  E.  R.  S.  Canby,1  directing-  the  Department  from 
Santa  Fe,  faced  a  particularly  difficult  problem.  His  superiors 
had  begun  to  withdraw  his  regular  troops  for  service  in  the 
East,  expecting  him  to  replace  these  with  volunteers  re- 
cruited by  the  territorial  authorities.  Many  of  his  officers, 
meanwhile,  were  resigning  to  join  the  Confederacy.  Further, 
he  had  information  that  forces  for  the  invasion  of  his  depart- 
ment were  assembling  in  Texas,  and  that  their  probable  route 
would  be  northward  through  the  Mesilla  Valley  of  the  Rio 
Grande,  above  El  Paso. 

Canby  moved  to  meet  this  complex  situation  by  pressing 
New  Mexico's  governor  in  his  slow  recruiting  of  volunteers,2 
by  alerting  his  own  loyal  officers  to  the  consequence  of  dis- 
loyalty among  their  former  colleagues  who  either  had  not  yet 
openly  resigned  or,  if  they  had,  were  still  in  the  department, 
and  by  reshuffling  among  the  territory's  scattered  posts  the 
few  units  of  regulars  left  to  him. 

Fort  Fillmore,3  forty  miles  north  of  El  Paso  and  six  miles 
from  the  secessionist  town  of  Mesilla,4  figured  as  the  pivot  of 
Canby's  strategy  against  the  invasion.  This  post  controlled 
the  stage  road  along  which  U.S.  detachments  of  regulars  were 
about  to  withdraw  eastward  from  Arizona.  Its  position  made 
it  the  first  objective  for  a  Confederate  advance  into  New 
Mexico.  Moreover,  Fort  Fillmore  was  the  jumping-off  place 
for  Canby's  resigning  officers:  it  was  the  last  fort  on  their 
most  direct  routes  from  all  corners  of  the  Department  to 
Confederate  territory,  and  hence  most  subject  to  their  under- 

1.  Edward  Richard  Sprigg  Canby  graduated  from  the  U.S.  Military  academy  in 
1839,  was  brevetted  to  his  captaincy  after  his  Mexican  War  service,  and  was  commis- 
sioned Colonel  of  the   19th   Infantry  in   May,   1861,   taking  over  the  command   of   the 
Department  of  New  Mexico  after  the  resignation  of  Colonel  William  Wing  Loring.  Just 
before  the  end  of  the  Civil  War  he  was  raised  to  Major  General.  He  was  murdered  by 
Modoc  Lndians  near  Van  Bremmer's  ranch,  California,  while  attempting  peace  negotia- 
tions in  1873. 

2.  Official  Records  of  the  War  of  the  Rebellion   (hereafter  designated  OR),  series 
I,  V.  4,  pp.  35-61. 

8.  Established  Sept.  23,  1851,  according  to  its  first  "Post  Return"  record  in  the 
National  Archives. 

4.  Then  the  largest  town  within  the  Gadsden  Purchase,  and  site  of  its  treaty's 
signing  in  1853.  A  stage  depot  on  the  Butterfield  Overland  Mail  until  it  ended  with 
Texas'  secession  early  in  1861. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  3 

mining  efforts  to  win  additional  Union  officers  and  enlisted 
men  for  the  Southern  cause. 

In  mid- June,  Canby  ordered  Major  Isaac  Lynde,  7th  In- 
fantry, to  abandon  Fort  McLane,5  and  take  over  the  command 
of  Fort  Fillmore.  He  warned  Lynde  of  the  possible  invasion 
from  Texas,  of  the  disaffection  of  the  Mesilla  Valley's  civilian 
population,  and  of  the  suspected  presence  of  rebel  sympa- 
thizers within  Fort  Fillmore  itself.  Canby  placed  all  respon- 
sibility for  the  Mesilla  area  with  Lynde,  including  the 
ultimate  decisions  to  attack  or  ignore  Fort  Bliss  at  El  Paso, 
then  held  by  the  secessionist  Texans,  and  to  defend  or  aban- 
don Fort  Fillmore.  Canby  also  delegated  to  Lynde  the  recruit- 
ing of  volunteers  in  the  neighborhood.  He  pointed  out  Fort 
Fillmore's  value  as  cover  for  the  troops  pulling  out  of  Ari- 
zona. He  made  clear  to  Lynde  that  he  had  no  intention  of 
drawing  off  regulars  from  Lynde's  command.  Instead,  he 
promised  reinforcements,  and  some  were  actually  put  in 
motion  toward  Fort  Fillmore.6 

Lynde  was  given  full  freedom  to  act  in  any  way  he  saw 
fit,  once  he  reached  his  new  post.  "Colonel  Canby  desires," 
wrote  Canby 's  aide,  "that  you  will  not  consider  yourself 
trammeled  by  instructions,  but  will  do  whatever  in  your 
judgment  will  best  secure  the  interest  of  the  United  States 
and  maintain  the  honor  of  its  flag,  and  he  wishes  you  to  feel 
assured  that  you  will  be  supported  by  every  means  in  his 
power."7 

A  civilian  observer  has  recorded  conditions  at  Fort  Fill- 
more  as  he  saw  them  just  before  Lynde's  arrival  and  for  a 
short  time  thereafter.  William  Wallace  Mills8  had  been  a 


6.    Near  the  Santa  Rita  copper  mines  and  the  headwaters  of  the  Mimbres  River, 
about  85  miles  west-northwest  of  Fort  Fillmore. 

6.  Anderson  to  Lynde,  June  30,  1861.  OR  I,  4,  p.  51,  mentions  reinforcements  from 
Fort  Buchanan  ordered  to  abandon  that  post  and  report  to  Lynde  at  Fort  Fillmore. 
A.  L.  Anderson,  2nd  Lieutenant,   5th  Infantry,  as  acting  Assistant  Adjutant  General 
in  Santa  Fe,  personally  transmitted  many  of  Canby's  instructions  to  commanders   at 
the  different  posts. 

7.  Anderson  to  Lynde,  June  16,  1861.  OR  I,  4,  p.  38. 

8.  The  author  of  Forty  Years  at  El  Pason,  1858-1898:  Chicago,   Press  of  W.  B. 
Conkey  Co.,  1901 — from  which  this  account  is  taken.  Mills  wrote  his  book  while  United 
States  Consul  at  Chihuahua  (from  1897  to  1907).  He  was  25  when  he  met  Lynde  at  Fort 
Fillmore.  He  quotes  an  extract  from  a  letter  Lynde  wrote  him  in  1871,  in  which  Lynde 
said  he  remembered  talking  to  Mills  ten  years  before  and  telling  Mills  that  he  did  not 
then  believe  that  "my  junior  officers  would  act  toward  me  as  they  did."  I  have  not  been 
able  to  locate  this  letter  or  anyone  among  Mills'  descendants  who  might  have  it. 


4  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

clerk  for  nearly  a  year  in  the  sutler's  store  at  Fort  Fillmore, 
but  had  gotten  another  job  in  El  Paso  just  before  the  war 
started.  Hearing  neighborhood  rumors  that  the  fort  might 
be  abandoned  before  Lynde  got  there,  and  more  rumors  of 
disloyalty  among  the  officers,  Mills  visited  Fort  Fillmore  on 
the  1st  of  July,  three  days  before  Lynde  came. 

Mills  talked  over  the  situation,  or  tried  to,  with  the  post's 
surgeon,  James  Cooper  McKee.  The  surgeon  showed  resent- 
ment when  Mills  questioned  the  loyalty  of  various  officers. 
However,  McKee's  assistant,  Dr.  Alden,  concurred  with  Mills' 
suspicions,  and  gave  him  a  note  of  warning  about  the  dis- 
quieting state  of  affairs  at  the  fort,  for  Mills  to  take  to  Canby 
in  Santa  Fe.  Mills  started  north  by  stage. 

A  rider  overtook  the  stage  with  a  message  from  Mesilla 
which  said  that  secessionists  planned  to  intercept  it  on  a 
desolate  stretch  known  as  the  Jornada  del  Muerto,9  to  remove 
Union  sympathizers.  But  at  Point  of  Rocks,  the  supposed 
place  of  interception,  Mills  noted  a  detachment  of  U.S. 
Mounted  Rifles,  under  Lieutenant  C.  H.  McNally,  encamped 
nearby.  Their  presence  no  doubt  discouraged  the  raid  that 
had  been  planned  on  the  coach. 

When  Mills  reached  Santa  Fe  and  saw  Canby,  that  officer 
told  Mills  he  was  then  in  process  of  removing  the  current 
commander  of  Fort  Fillmore,  Captain  Lane,  and  had  ordered 
Lynde  to  take  over.  Canby  gave  Mills  dispatches  to  take  back 
to  Lynde.  When  Mills  got  back  to  Fort  Fillmore,  Lynde  had 
arrived  there  eleven  days  before. 

The  secessionist  Mesilla  Times  had  let  the  situation  at  the 
fort  be  known  to  the  whole  valley.  The  entire  neighborhood 
knew  of  Lynde's  expected  appearance  to  the  approximate 
day.  The  Times  reported  planned  troop  movements  to  and 
from  the  fort,  and  even  the  exact  date  when  a  dispatch  for 
reinforcements  had  been  sent  to  another  post,  with  the  num- 
ber of  wagons  sent  to  transport  them.  Secessionists  in  Mesilla 
knew  exactly  how  large  a  garrison  was  projected.  They  knew 

9.  A  90-mile  stretch  of  desert,  without  wells  in  those  days,  but  heavily  travelled 
since  the  time  of  the  Conquistadores.  It  was  a  short  cut,  leaving  the  Rio  Grande  about 
20  miles  north  of  Fort  Fillmore,  to  meet  it  again  near  Fort  Craig.  Despite  its  dangers 
from  Indians  and  thirst,  travellers  preferred  it,  rather  than  follow  the  river,  which 
curved  widely  and  made  a  much  longer  route. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  5 

the  probable  state  of  the  enlisted  men's  morale  and  their  pay- 
roll troubles.  The  Times  told  of  a  rifle  company  refusing  to  be 
paid  twelve  months'  arrears  in  drafts,  holding  out  for  cash. 
Morale  must  have  dropped  even  lower  when  the  men  read 
that  Union  troops  at  another  fort  not  far  away  had  been  paid 
in  full  the  week  before. 10 

Major  Lynde  reached  Fort  Fillmore  in  the  first  week  of 
July.  He  found  the  cavalry  section  nearly  dismounted,  for 
local  secessionists  had  run  off  with  most  of  the  horses.  He 
acknowledged  dispatches  from  Canby  naming  specific  officers 
to  suspect  and  watch  on  their  way  through  Fort  Fillmore  to 
Texas,  but  said  he  had  no  cause  to  question  the  sympathies 
of  the  personnel  then  stationed  at  the  post.  He  told  Canby 
how  poorly  he  thought  the  fort  was  situated  for  defense,  and 
that  it  was  not  worth  the  exertion  to  hold  it ;  yet  he  saw  little 
reason  to  expect  an  attack  since  he  felt  he  now  had  enough 
troops  to  intimidate  the  Texans,  despite  his  pessimism  about 
being  able  to  raise  local  volunteers.11  It  is  probably  fair  to  say 
that  Lynde's  messages  to  Canby  during  the  first  three  weeks 
of  July  show  an  inadequate  estimate  of  the  danger,  and  a 
divided  mind  on  nearly  every  issue. 

Lynde's  situation  was  complicated  further  by  Apache 
raids  on  his  livestock.  The  Mesilla  Times  of  July  20th  reported 
that  Apaches  attacked  the  hay  camp  at  Fort  Fillmore  on  July 
17th,  taking  a  boy  prisoner  and  driving  off  mules ;  and  that 
the  next  day  they  passed  within  a  half  mile  of  the  fort,  crossed 
the  Rio  Grande  near  Santo  Tomas,  a  village  just  south  of 
Mesilla  and  five  miles  from  Lynde  and  his  troops,  to  run  off 
two  thousand  sheep  and  kill  two  herders.  A  company  of 
infantry  pursued  the  Apaches  to  the  foothills,  ".  .  .  and  re- 
turned without  losing  a  man  !"12 

When  Mills  got  back  to  Fort  Fillmore  with  Canby's  dis- 
patches to  Lynde,  Captain  Lane,  the  former  commander,  was 
still  there.  He  accused  Mills  of  carrying  false  tales  to  Canby. 
Captain  Garland,  for  whom  Lynde  had  vouched  to  Canby,  ran 

10.  Mesilla  Times,  June  30,  1861.  All  Times  reports,  unless  otherwise  noted,  are  to 
be  found  in  the  so-called  Hayes  Scrap  collection,  Bancroft  Library,  University  of  Cali- 
fornia at  Berkeley. 

11.  Lynde  to  Canby,  July  7,  1861.  OR  I,  4. 

12.  N.Y.  Times  of  August  8,  1861,  reprinting  Mesilla  Times  report  of  July  20,  1861. 


6  NEW  MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

off  that  same  night  to  the  rebels  at  Fort  Bliss.  Mills  suspected 
that  copies  of  the  dispatches  he  had  just  delivered  went 
with  Garland. 

Lynde  called  in  his  aide,  Lieutenant  Brooks,  and  let  him 
read  the  dispatches.  Mills  says  that  Brooks  showed  little 
desire  to  shed  blood  for  his  country.  Canby's  orders  to  Lynde, 
according  to  Mills,  were  to  take  Fort  Bliss  and  the  stores 
there,  and  this  Mills  believed  would  have  been  easy.  No  such 
order,  however,  exists  in  Canby's  recorded  correspondence. 

Mills  says  Lynde  told  him  of  the  feeling  against  Mills 
among  the  Fort  Fillmore  staff,  and  of  his  opinion  that  Mills 
had  acted  unwisely  to  report  his  suspicions  to  Canby,  even 
while  Lynde  confessed  that  some  of  his  officers  were  of  South- 
ern sympathy.  Mills  then  told  Lynde  that  "treachery  and 
ruin"  were  all  around  him.  Lynde  asked  Mills  to  ascertain  the 
size  of  the  Confederate  invading  force,  which  Mills  sub- 
sequently did,  sending  an  outline  of  the  exact  strength 
opposing  Lynde.  Mills  says  Lynde  "did  not  move"  on  this 
knowledge. 

As  will  be  shown  further,  Lynde  seems  to  have  been  in 
the  habit  of  inviting  opinions  and  ideas  not  only  from  civil- 
ians, but  from  members  of  his  command  supposedly  less 
qualified  than  he  to  plan  his  operations. 

It  is  a  question  whether  Isaac  Lynde's  career  up  to  this 
time  had  fitted  him  for  the  high  responsibility  he  now  carried. 
While  his  father,  Cornelius  Lynde,  had  been  looked  upon  as  a 
military  man  in  the  small  Vermont  village  of  Williamstown, 
this  reputation  came  from  only  a  year  of  service  ending  in 
1800.  There  is  no  record  of  Isaac's  progress  from  his  birth 
about  1805  to  his  recommendation  by  neighbors,  in  1822, 
for  appointment  to  the  U.S.  Military  Academy.  They  de- 
scribed him  as  "an  intelligent,  sprightly  lad,"  handsome,  and 
well  educated.13  He  entered  the  Academy  in  July  of  1823,  and 
graduated  four  years  later,  thirty-second  in  a  class  of  thirty- 
eight.  He  was  sent  immediately  to  a  long  succession  of  fron- 
tier posts,  at  first  in  the  Old  Northwest,  later  on  the  far  plains 


13.  EUjah  Paine  and  Dudley  Chace  to  Sec'y  of  War,  November  13,  1822.  From 
Lynde's  "Appointments,  Commissions  and  Personal"  file  (L736-ACP-1866),  in  the 
National  Archives. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  7 

and  deserts.  He  rose  by  routine  promotions  through  only 
three  full  grades  in  thirty-four  years.  Although  he  served  in 
the  Mexican  War,  his  record  includes  no  battles  or  distinction 
of  any  kind.14  As  the  posts  of  the  Army  moved  west  in  the 
country's  expansion,  his  place  in  the  infantry  gave  him  little 
chance  for  noteworthy  action.  Foot  soldiers  served  as  fixed 
garrisons,  mainly,  while  the  cavalry  performed  as  the  active 
arm.  Perhaps  Lynde  lacked  the  experience  or  enough  train- 
ing in  decision  that  events  were  soon  to  demand.  His  prepa- 
rations for  defense,  recorded  in  his  messages  to  Canby,  show 
too  little  comprehension  of  his  tactical  problems  at  Fort  Fill- 
more,  or  of  the  temper  of  his  command  and  the  civilian  com- 
munity around  him. 

We  know  that  in  the  weeks  before  his  disastrous  sur- 
render he  was  under  many  pressures.  One  came  from  the 
disloyalty  of  colleagues  on  their  way  through  to  Texas,  plus 
the  disloyalty  among  his  immediate  command.  Other  kinds  of 
pressure  came  from  the  Apaches,  from  the  secessionist  civil- 
ians, and  from  the  enemy  gathering  at  El  Paso.  Add  to  these 
a  lack  of  sufficient  equipment,  especially  in  mounts  for  his 
cavalry  section;  the  grumbling  among  unpaid  units  of  his 
troops ;  the  fort's  women  and  children  whom  he  was  reluctant 
to  send  away,  weakly  escorted,  through  hostile  and  waterless 
desert.  These  pressures  and  his  poor  means  of  communication 
with  his  superiors  together  might  have  worn  down  a  leader 
bigger  than  Lynde. 

In  this  situation  arose  an  overbearing  personality  in  the 
shape  of  McKee,  the  post  surgeon — officious,  presumptuous, 
eternally  right. 

James  Cooper  McKee15  had  been  stationed  once  before  at 
Fort  Fillmore,  and  knew  many  inhabitants  of  the  area.  He 

14.  Cullum,  Maj.  Gen.  George  W.,  Biographical  Register  of  the  officers  and  graduates 
of  the  U.S.  Military  Academy:  N.Y.,  D.  Van  Nostrand,  1868.  Nearly  every  officer  of 
Lynde's  acquaintance,  whether  an  Academy  graduate  or  not,  had  received  recognition 
for  Mexican  War  service.  Many  had  wounds  in  addition  to  their  decorations  and  promo- 
tions. Colonel  W.  W.  Loring  had  lost  an  arm  in  Mexico.  Lynde's  fellow  West  Pointers 
and   many  enlisted  superiors  and  subordinates   would  seem  to  have  experienced  more 
action  than  he,   and  thereby  could  have  been   influenced   somewhat  in  their  attitudes 
toward  him. 

15.  According  to  Francis  B.  Heitman's  Historical  Register  and  Dictionary  of  the 
U.S.  Army  (Gov't  Printing  Office,  Wash.,  D.C.  1903),  Post  Surgeon  McKee  came  from 
Pennsylvania  and  was  appointed  Assistant  Surgeon  in  1858.  On  parole  after  Lynde's 


8  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

had  returned  under  orders  after  Lynde  took  over  the  com- 
mand. Immediately  upon  his  arrival,  McKee  says,16  he  sensed 
a  coolness  among  old  friends  in  Mesilla  who  had  become 
secessionists. 

McKee  alone  reports  on  Lynde's  appearance:  gray  hair 
and  beard,  venerable,  quiet,  reticent,  retiring,  giving  ". . .  an 
impression  of  wisdom  and  knowledge  of  his  profession." 

After  a  short  time  McKee  came  to  doubt  the  Major's  effi- 
ciency and  bravery.  "I  sadly  saw  no  effort  to  put  the  command 
in  fighting  trim  ...  no  measures  taken  . . .  against  surprise." 

He  warned  Lynde  of  the  hampering  effect  of  so  many 
wives  and  children,  probably  a  hundred  persons  altogether, 
but  he  saw  no  attempt  by  Lynde  to  get  them  out  of  the  way  to 
a  safer  place.  He  believed  Lynde  to  be  a  man  treacherous  to 
the  Union  cause,  deliberately  exposing  Fort  Fillmore  to  cap- 
ture through  neglect  of  the  sensible  preparations  any  loyal 
commander  would  have  made  in  those  circumstances. 

In  telling  of  Lynde's  actions  and  his  own,  McKee  reveals 
an  arrogance,  and  an  eagerness  to  pre-empt  the  functions  of 
others,  that  could  well  have  been  highly  irritating  to  the 
Major.  Although  a  medical  man,  he  took  it  upon  himself  to 
organize  various  aspects  of  the  defense,  not  only  by  drilling 
troops  not  assigned  to  him,  but  by  tagging  along  with  Lynde 
on  rides  over  the  surrounding  terrain,  to  point  out  the  best 
disposal  of  the  troops  at  various  points.  One  day  he  got  Lynde 
to  go  with  him  in  his  buggy  to  Mesilla,  and  there  he  indi- 
cated what  he  judged  the  best  store-rooms  and  houses  for 
troops  to  occupy  if  the  town  were  taken. 

The  reader  of  McKee's  narrative  begins  to  marvel  at 
Lynde's  endurance  of  so  much  meddling  from  one  unschooled 
in  military  strategy  and  tactics,  whose  manner  may  too  well 
have  resembled  his  writing  style.  A  tone  of  ponderous  satire 

surrender,  he  was  for  a  time  sent  to  Camp  Butler,  Illinois,  where  he  took  charge  of  a 
hospital  for  sick  and  wounded  Confederate  prisoners  of  war.  His  reports  from  there 
(OR  II,  8,  p.  647  ff.)  indicate  a  marked  concern  for  the  prisoners'  welfare.  After  parole, 
he  served  in  the  war,  to  be  promoted  to  Major  Surgeon  in  December,  1864,  and  brevetted 
to  Lieutenant  Colonel  in  1865  for  faithful  and  meritorious  service.  In  1887,  he  became 
a  Lieutenant  Colonel  Surgeon.  He  retired  in  June,  1891,  and  died  in  December,  1897. 
16.  Unless  otherwise  indicated,  the  McKee  material  comes  from  his  Narrative  of  the 
surrender  of  a  command  of  U.S.  forces  at  Fort  Fillmore,  N.M.  in  July,  A.D.,  1861 :  John 
A.  Lowell  Co.,  Boston,  1886,  3rd  edition. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  9 

resounds  in  McKee's  remarks.  He  is  far  from  dispassionate, 
seemingly  intent  on  erasing  Lynde  as  a  human  being. 

This  is  the  man  who  became  angry  with  Mills,  whom  Mc- 
Kee  saw  as  a  busybody  stirring  up  the  affairs  of  the  fort.  His 
failure  to  see  himself  in  this  role  shows  a  convenient  obtuse- 
ness.  It  is  interesting  that  his  anger  arose  over  the  question  of 
loyalty  among  the  officers.  McKee  is  the  sort  of  man  who 
insists  on  his  own  wisdom  so  sharply  that  when  he  is  wrong 
he  is  hopelessly  wrong,  committed  to  a  fallacy  forever.  His 
denial  that  disloyalty  existed  goes  against  the  facts  which 
even  Canby  detected,  analyzing  reports  three  hundred  miles 
away  in  Santa  Fe.17 

At  the  moment  when  Lynde's  problems  had  reached  their 
most  tangled  complication,  his  formal  enemy,  but  by  no  means 
his  worst,  at  last  appeared. 

On  the  night  of  July  24th,  a  body  of  Confederate  troops 
under  Lieutenant-Colonel  John  R.  Baylor  camped  within  six 
hundred  yards  of  Fort  Fillmore,  intending  to  attack  at  day- 
light. A  deserting  rebel  picket  warned  Lynde  and  spoiled 
the  plan.18  On  the  following  morning,  Baylor  moved  across 
the  Rio  Grande  to  take  the  village  of  Santo  Tomas.  There  he 
captured  supplies  and  stragglers  from  a  detail  Lynde  had  sent 
a  week  previously  to  guard  the  road  from  El  Paso  to  Mesilla. 
Then  Baylor  went  north  to  Mesilla  and  billeted  his  command. 

Lynde  seems  to  have  had  full  information  on  Baylor's  ap- 
proach. He  reports19  that  the  deserting  picket  estimated  the 
Confederates  at  three  to  four  hundred.  Lynde  says  he  ordered 
the  two  outposted  companies  to  return  from  Santo  Tomas  and 
kept  his  troops  under  arms  until  daylight,  the  night  of  the 
Confederates'  proximity.  It  is  apparent  that  he  decided  that 


17.  Knowledge  of  the  danger  had  spread  widely  in  the  Department.  Colonel  Ben- 
jamin S.  Roberts,  commander  at  Fort  Stanton  in  1861,  and  Lynde's  successor  in  charge 
of  the  southern  New  Mexico  military  district  after  Lynde's  surrender,  testified  a  year 
later  to  the  damage  done  by  "deserting"  officers.  He  referred  particularly  to  Fort  Fill- 
more,  saying  it  served  as  a  rendezvous  for  such  officers,  that  they  tried  "mightily"  to  get 
Lynde's  command  to  desert,  and  that  they  so  demoralized  the  Fort  Fillmore  troops  that 
Lynde's  surrender  "was  directly  consequent  upon  that  state  of  demoralization,  as  he  had 
no  confidence  that  his  men  would  fight."   (Roberts'  testimony  before  the  Committee  on 
the  Conduct  of  the  War,  37th  Congress,  3rd  Session,  Senate  Reports  4,  p.  366 ) . 

18.  Mentioned  by  Lynde  and  Baylor  in  OR  I,  4  ;  Hank  Smith  in  his  Memoirs  (full 
citation  hereafter)  ;  the  Mesilla  Times,  August  3,  1861. 

19.  Lynde  to  Anderson,  July  26,  1861.  OR  I,  4,  p.  4. 


10  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Baylor  must  be  driven  from  Mesilla,  for  he  took  immediate 
action  when  Baylor  reached  it. 

Leaving  one  company  of  infantry  and  the  band  to  hold  the 
fort,  he  set  his  troops  in  motion,  shortly  before  noon  on  July 
25th,  to  cross  the  intervening  bottom  land  and  river,  toward 
the  village  six  miles  away.  His  attacking  force  was  three 
hundred  and  eighty  men.  One  of  his  infantry  companies 
served  as  artillery,  manning  the  howitzers.  According  to 
Lynde's  estimate,  the  Confederates,  augmented  by  belligerent 
citizens  of  Mesilla,  numbered  nearly  six  hundred  men.20 

Two  miles  from  the  town,  Lynde  sent  his  aide,  Lieutenant 
Brooks21,  forward  with  a  white  flag,  demanding  surrender. 
Brooks  was  met  by  Major  Waller,  Baylor's  second  in  com- 
mand, and  a  Confederate  colonel  whose  last  name  was  Her- 
bert. They  said  that  if  Lynde  wanted  Mesilla,  he  was  to  come 
and  get  it.  Lynde  then  moved  his  howitzers  forward  and  had 
them  fire  shells  at  long  range.  The  shells  burst  short  in  the 
air.  The  command  moved  slowly  toward  the  houses.  Men 
hauled  and  pushed  the  howitzers  through  heavy  sand.22  From 
a  cornfield  and  house  on  the  Union  right,  a  heavy  musket  fire 
raked  Lynde's  troops,  killing  three  men,  wounding  two  offi- 
cers and  four  men.  Because  the  night  was  coming  on,  says 
Lynde,  and  because  his  howitzers  were  useless  due  to  the 
sand,  he  withdrew  across  the  river  and  returned  to  the  fort. 

Such  was  the  whole  extent  of  Lynde's  attack  on  Baylor. 
He  crossed  a  shallow  river  with  three  hundred  and  eighty 
men,  advanced  six  miles,  fired  two  howitzer  shells,  received 
one  volley  from  the  rebel  muskets,  and  thereupon  withdrew. 

What  happened  to  Lynde  at  Mesilla?  Some  have  insisted 
he  turned  tail  through  cowardice.  Others  have  called  it 

20.  Mesilla  Times,  August  3,  1861,  estimates  Baylor's  force  at  253  effectives,  plus 
"...  a  number  of  the  citizens  of  Mesilla  and  El  Paso  .  .  .",  bringing  the  total  to  "about 
300  men." 

21.  Lynde  does  not  mention  McKee  here  in  the  official  report    (OR  I,   4,   p.  4), 
although  McKee  in  his  statement    (ibid.,  p.   12),  says  he  accompanied  Brooks.   In  his 
Narrative,  McKee  says  Lynde  asked  him  to  go  with  Brooks  because  he  knew  many  of 
the  townspeople. 

22.  Ordinarily,   12-pound  howitzers  were  serviced  both  in  order  of  march  and  in 
battery  by  six  men  and  three  mules    (Viele,  Egbert  L.,  Handbook  for  active  service: 
N.Y.,  D.  Van  Nostrand,  1861).  Mules  at  the  fort  may  have  been  stolen,  with  the  horses, 
a  month  previously  as  reported  in  the  Mesilla  Times,  June  30,  1861. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  11 

treachery.  Lynde  himself  shortly  after  reported  it  as  strategy, 
dictated  by  the  oncoming  dark  and  the  useless  guns. 

Canby  was  to  offer,  twelve  months  later,  what  might  well 
be  the  most  reasonable  explanation,  different  from  all  others. 
But  by  the  time  Canby  spoke,  Lynde's  action  and  the  possible 
motives  for  it  were  blurred  and  lost,  possibly  forever,  in  the 
roar  of  less  rational  voices  than  Canby's,  and  in  the  thunder 
of  an  accelerated,  bigger  war.  Lynde  would  add  more  reasons 
when  appealing  for  justice  a  few  month  hence,  but  mean- 
while his  official  statement  written  the  following  day  was 
bare  to  the  point  of  reticence.  Others,  however,  saw,  or 
thought  they  saw,  more  in  the  skirmish  than  did  Lynde — at 
least  more  than  he  then  put  on  paper.  Their  reports  indicate 
a  knottier  tactical  problem  than  Lynde  outlined  to  Canby. 
The  Mesilla  Times,  nine  days  after  the  skirmish,  paints  the 
richest  picture  of  all: 

About  5  o'clock  the  clouds  of  dust  indicated  the  enemy  were 
advancing  for  an  attack  towards  the  Southern  part  of  the  city. 
The  whole  force  was  moved  to  that  point  and  every  precaution 
made  to  give  them  the  warmest  of  receptions.  Several  of  the 
principal  streets  of  Mesilla  converge  at  the  Southern  end  of  the 
town,  the  houses  forming  an  angle  and  are  quite  scattered,  old 
corrals  and  the  proximity  of  the  cornfields  make  the  position  a 
very  advantageous  one  for  defense.  The  companies  were  sta- 
tioned on  the  tops  of  the  adobe  houses  and  behind  the  corrals. 
Capt.  Coopwoods  company  was  mounted.  The  citizens  posted 
themselves  on  the  tops  of  the  houses  on  the  principal  streets, 
prepared  to  render  their  assistance.23 

At  that  time,  Mesilla's  "citizens,"  if  the  Times  means  able- 
bodied  men,  would  probably  have  numbered  six  or  seven  hun- 
dred, since  the  "city"  had  a  total  population  of  a  little  over 
two  thousand  men,  women  and  children.  The  "principal 
streets"  were — and  still  are — dirt  roads.  Mesilla  was  the 
rawest  kind  of  frontier  village.  Hence,  there  must  have  been 
a  disproportionate  number  of  unattached  males,  and  even  the 
seven  hundred  count  could  be  low. 

The  Times  continues : 

The  enemy  advanced  to  within  500  yards  of  our  position 
and  halted  and  formed  the  line  of  battle  with  two  howitzers  in 


23.    Mesilla  Times,  August  3,  1861. 


12  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

the  centre  and  the  infantry  and  on  the  wings  the  cavalry,  the 
whole  force  appearing  to  be  about  500  men.  A  flag  of  truce  was 
then  sent  to  our  position  with  the  modest  demand  to  surrender 
the  town  unconditionally,  the  reply  was  'that  if  they  wished  the 
town  to  come  and  take  it.'  They  unmasked  their  guns,  and  com- 
menced firing  bombs  and  grape  into  a  town  crowded  with 
women  and  children,  without  having  in  accordance  with  an 
invariable  rule  of  civilized  warfare  given  notice  to  remove  the 
women  and  children  to  a  place  of  safety. 

This  exact  language  will  be  heard  again,  in  the  narrative 
McKee  published  seventeen  years  later.  The  town  had  five 
hours  to  dispose  the  noncombatants  from  the  time  Lynde  was 
observed  crossing  the  river.  The  watchers  must  have  dis- 
covered his  howitzers  enroute.  They  must  have  guessed  his 
intentions.  Their  own  neglect  of  precautions  for  the  safety 
of  the  women  and  children  presents  a  riddle. 

The  Times  goes  on  to  describe  the  Union  cavalry  charge, 
its  repulse  by  Confederate  musket  fire,  and  the  killing  of  four 
troopers  and  the  wounding  of  four,  causing  a  retreat  in 
confusion. 

".  .  .  The  order  was  given  to  charge  four  times  to  no 
purpose . . ." 

Then,  according  to  the  Times,  the  Texans  performed  an 
ancient  trick : 

Capt.  Coopwoods  company  had  been  continually  employed 
in  deploying  among  the  houses  and  corrals,  first  appearing 
mounted  and  then  on  foot,  and  appearing  in  many  different 
positions  .  .  .  succeeded  in  greatly  deceiving  the  enemy  as  to 
our  real  force  .  .  . 

Perhaps  the  most  striking  feature  of  the  Times'  account  is 
its  openly  partisan  tone.  The  reporter  speaks  as  if  formally 
sworn  to  the  military  oath  of  the  Confederacy. 

McKee's  first  version  of  the  Mesilla  skirmish  is  included 
in  a  report  to  the  Surgeon  General  dated  three  weeks  after 
the  event.24  He  says  that  when  Lynde's  force  moved  forward, 
the  cavalry  was  in  front,  the  artillery  in  the  road.  The  howit- 
zers fired  into  an  enemy  group  on  the  right  and  scattered  it. 

24.    OR  I,  4.  p.  11. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  13 

When  the  Confederate  muskets  answered,  Private  Lane  of 
the  Mounted  Rifles  and  two  men  in  Lieutenant  Crilly's  cavalry 
unit  were  killed.  Lieutenant  McNally  of  the  Rifles  was 
wounded.  McKee  says  Lynde  told  him  to  prepare  the  wounded 
for  retreat. 

He  embellished  this  brief  account  seventeen  years  after 
the  incident  from  notes  and  memoranda  he  claims  to  have 
made  at  Fort  Fillmore  in  those  days.  After  telling  of  Lynde's 
demand  for  Mesilla's  surrender,  and  Baylor's  refusal,  McKee 
says  he  offered  to  care  for  the  Confederates  soon  to  be 
wounded.  This  offer  was  rejected  "abruptly."  Less  patient 
with  him  than  Lynde,  the  Confederate  officers  were  telling 
McKee,  in  effect,  to  mind  his  own  business.  They  had  their 
own  surgeons,  they  said. 

McKee's  narrative  agrees  in  substance  with  the  Mesilla 
Times,  in  telling  of  Lynde's  strange  disposal  of  his  force : 

...  he  ordered  Lieut.  McNally25  to  deploy  his  column 
mounted  in  front  of  the  infantry  .  .  .  conspicuous  targets  for 
the  Texans  lying  .  .  .  concealed  in  the  adobe  house  .  .  .  Lieut. 
McNally  was  shot  through  the  apex  of  one  of  his  lungs,  four 
men  killed  and  several  wounded  .  .  .  [the  cavalry]  at  this  sur- 
prise retreated  behind  the  infantry . . . 

Here  McKee  repeats  the  language  of  the  Times  account 
almost  verbatim : 

. .  .  Lieut.  Crilly26  was  ordered  to  fire  shells  into  the  town 
full  of  women  and  children ;  indeed,  I  heard  Lynde  order  Crilly 
to  fire  a  shell  at  a  group  of  women,  children,  and  unarmed  men, 


25.  Christopher  Hely  McNally,  born  in  England,  came  to  the  United  States  some 
time  before  December,  1848,  at  which  time  he  became  a  sergeant  in  the  Mounted  Rifles. 
He  is  mentioned  in  General  Orders  No.  22,  of  1858   (Senate  Documents,  35th  Congress, 
2nd  Session,  Report  of  the  Sec'y  of  War,  p.  20)  where  he  is  reported  to  have  taken  part, 
as  a  2nd  Lieutenant,  in  a  battle  against  the  Mogollon  Indians  in  the  Gila  River  area,  May 
24,  1857.  For  his  action  at  Mesilla,  he  was  later  brevetted  to  a  captaincy.  He  served 
through  the  Civil  War,  after  he  recovered  from  his  Mesilla  wound  and  had  been  exchanged 
out  of  parole,  and  was  raised  to  a  major's  rank  in  November,   1865,   for  meritorious 
service.  Except  for  the  date  of  his  death  in  1889,  Heitman  lists  nothing  further  on  him. 

26.  Francis  J.   Crilly,   2nd   Lieutenant,   7th   Infantry,   was   only  two  years   out  of 
West  Point  at  this  time.  1st  Lieutenant  Cressy,  Mounted  Rifles,  another  of  Lynde's  officers, 
had  graduated  the  year  before  Crilly.  Their  classes  contained  less  than  thirty  members 
each,  so  they  must  have  known  each  other  well  at  the  Academy.  Crilly  was  exchanged 
from  parole  and  went  back  into  the  war  the  following  year.  At  its  close  he  was  brevetted 
to  Major  and  Lieutenant  Colonel,  served  five  more  years  and  resigned  from  the  Army 
in  1869. 


14  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

on  one  of  the  sand-hills  to  our  left  front;  a  shell  was  so  fired; 
luckily  it  fell  short,  and  no  harm  was  done.  The  frightened 
crowd  dispersed  rapidly.  So,  without  having,  in  accordance 
with  the  humane  rule  of  civilized  warfare,  given  notice  to  re- 
move the  women  and  children  to  a  place  of  safety,  shells  were 
thrown  into  different  parts  of  the  town,  fortunately  injuring 
no  one . .  ,27 

It  seems  quite  certain  that  McKee  relied  on  the  old  news- 
paper to  augment  his  "notes  and  memoranda  taken  at  Fort 
Fillmore."  If  he  did,  one  wonders  how  he  got  a  copy  of  an 
issue  dated  nine  days  after  the  incident  when  he  was  far  away 
from  the  area — or  a  copy  seventeen  years  old  when  he  sat 
down  to  write  his  Narrative. 

At  Lynde's  order,  McKee,  apparently  snorting  like  a  war 
horse,  departed  from  the  field  of  withheld  glory.  He  put  the 
dead  and  wounded  into  his  ambulance  "reluctantly."  Then  he 
placed  McNally  on  a  litter  and  started  for  the  river  with  the 
column. 

McNally  turned  in  his  report  of  the  action.  It  was  included 
among  the  depositions  sent  by  Canby  in  September  to  the 
Adjutant  General's  Office.  It  strengthens  a  conviction  one  gets 
from  various  remarks  by  McKee,  that  McNally  and  McKee 
were  close  friends.  Before  describing  the  attack  on  Mesilla, 
McNally  tells  how  he  and  the  surgeon  "...  insisted  upon 
Lynde's  sending  away  the  women  and  children,  103  in  num- 
ber from  the  fort.  He  had  an  opportunity  to  send  them  away, 
but  refused.  After  this  [McNally  and  McKee]  insisted  upon 
his  occupying  Mesilla  .  .  ."  Either  Lynde  first  appeared  to 
this  pair  as  putty,  later  disappointing  them  with  his  resist- 
ance to  their  meddling  (which  on  McNally's  part,  at  least, 
sounds  like  insubordination),  or  he  invited  their  opinions 
out  of  weakness.  One  cannot  be  sure. 

Later,  McNally  recounts,  in  the  third  person  as  was  re- 
quired for  such  a  statement,  that  twice  he  induced  Lynde  to 
order  the  rebel  flag  hauled  down  in  Mesilla. 

.  .  .  twice  he  gave  the  order ;  twice  McNally  was  saddled 
up  [to  go  to  the  town  and  haul  down  the  flag]  and  twice  he  re- 
scinded it.  The  second  time  his  adjutant,  Mr.  Brooks,  (who  had 


27.    Narrative,  p.  16. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  15 

previously  resigned,)28  came  to  McNally  and  told  him  that  he 
had  prevented  his  going  to  Mesilla,  as  he  thought  it  best  not  to 
bring  on  a  collision  with  the  Texans.  The  first  time  he  would 
have  gone,  but  he  (Brooks)  prevented  it.29 

The  day  after  the  rebel  picket  warned  the  fort,  McNally's 
detachment  scouted  the  valley,  to  keep  track  of  Baylor's 
movements.  Even  this  small  mission  felt  the  presence  of 
Surgeon  McKee.  The  doctor  now  had  assumed  a  new  duty 
as  the  eyes  of  the  fort,  in  addition  to  organizing  its  garrison 
and  planning  its  defense. 

In  describing  the  skirmish  at  Mesilla,  McNally  records 
confusion  in  several  new  aspects: 

.  .  .  [Lynde]  ordered  McNally  to  form  and  go  ahead  .  .  . 
got  within  60  or  70  yards  .  .  .  Halted,  and  reported  in  person 
that  they  were  there  in  the  jacals  and  corn  fields  .  .  .  McNally 
dismounted  and  fired  at  random.  They  fired  another  volley.  Re- 
mounted, not  being  supported.  Sent  to  Major  Lynde,  who 
could  not  be  found,  and  not  being  supported  by  infantry  or 
artillery,  ordered  his  men  to  retreat.  In  retreating,  the  Seventh 
Infantry  fired  into  us  . .  ,29 

Baylor's  report,  written  two  months  later,  says  that  the 
Union  horsemen  ".  .  .  retreated  hastily,  running  over  the 
infantry  ..."  In  a  few  moments  he  saw  Lynde's  command 
marching  back  to  Fort  Fillmore : 

. . .  but  supposing  it  to  be  a  feint,  intended  to  draw  me  from  my 
position,  I  did  not  pursue  them,  but  kept  my  position  until 
next  morning,  the  26th,  expecting  that  they  would  attack  us 
under  cover  of  night. 

The  enemy  not  appearing,  I  sent  my  spies  to  reconnoiter, 
and  discover,  if  possible,  their  movements.  The  spies  reported 
the  enemy  at  work  at  the  fort  making  breastworks  ...  I  sent 
an  express  to  Fort  Bliss,  ordering  up  the  artillery  .  .  .30 

In  Lynde's  report  to  Canby,  dated  the  day  following  his 
action  at  Mesilla,  he  says  he  is  ". . .  hourly  expecting  attack," 

28.  This  is  the  only  reference  to  Brooks'  resignation  in  any  of  the  statements  and 
reports,  although  Heitman  lists  his  resignation  as  dated  May  16,  1861.  No  explanation 
of  his  subsequent  presence  in  Lynde's  command  has  come  to  light. 

29.  OR  I,  4,  p.  14. 

80.    Baylor  to  T.  A.  Washington,  September  21,  1861.  OR  I,  4,  pp.  17-20. 


16  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  tells  of  spending  the  day  fortifying  the  fort  with  sand- 
bags.31 

His  tardiness  in  this  procedure  is  cause  for  wonder.  Fort 
Fillmore's  plan  was  peculiarly  innocent  of  the  basic  pro- 
visions for  defense,  standing  as  it  did  like  a  square-bottomed 
U,  its  open  end  facing  the  river  and  the  road  from  El  Paso. 
It  stood  at  the  edge  of  a  most  inviting  sweep  of  level  land 
for  attacking  cavalry.  As  Lynde  had  reported  on  arrival,  the 
fort  was  not  in  position  to  withstand  a  siege : 

...  It  is  placed  in  a  basin,  surrounded  by  sand  hills  .  .  . 
and  they  are  covered  by  a  dense  growth  of  chaparral.  These 
sand  hills  completely  command  the  post,  and  render  it  inde- 
fensible against  a  force  supplied  with  artillery.  A  force  of  a 
thousand  men  could  approach  within  500  yards  under  perfect 
cover . . . 

Now,  in  the  skirmish  report,  Lynde  tells  Canby  that  he  is 
sending  an  express  to  a  Captain  Gibbs,  apparently  on  his  way 
from  Fort  Craig  southward  toward  Fort  Fillmore  with  a 
cavalry  detachment,  telling  Gibbs  to  turn  and  go  back.  Lynde 
adds  that  orders  will  go  out  to  the  troops  coming  in  from 
Arizona,  alerting  them  to  the  dangerous  situation  at  Fort 
Fillmore,  and  directing  them  to  turn  short  of  the  post  and 
proceed  by  the  nearest  route  northward  to  Fort  Craig. 

The  tone  throughout  this  report  is  that  of  a  man  who  has 
made  an  orderly  withdrawal  to  a  position  which,  although  it 
had  not  previously  been  prepared,  can  now  effectively  be  de- 
fended. He  does  not  say  that  he  is  thinking  of  abandoning  the 
fort,  or  that  he  has  decided  to  abandon  it,  or  that  he  is  in  the 
process  of  doing  so.  He  is  building  up  its  defenses  while  he 
awaits  an  attack  by  Baylor. 

It  must  have  shocked  Canby,  therefore,  when  he  opened 
Lynde's  next  dispatch,  dated  August  7th,  not  from  Fort  Fill- 
more,  but  from  Fort  Craig : 

Sir :  On  the  26th  of  July  I  had  the  honor  to  report  the  fact 
of  an  unsuccessful  attempt  to  dislodge  the  Texan  troops  from 
the  town  of  Mesilla,  since  which  events  of  the  greatest  conse- 
quence to  my  command  have  occurred.  They  are  now  prisoners 
of  war . .  ,32 


81.    Lynde  to  Canby,  July  7,  1861.  OR  I,  4,  p.  4. 

32.    Lynde  to  Anderson,  August  7,  1861.  OR  I,  4,  pp.  5-6. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  17 

The  day  of  his  sandbag  message,  Lynde  had  heard  that 
the  enemy  would  get  artillery  during  the  night.  If  he  went  to 
intercept  it,  Baylor  could  have  attacked  the  fort  in  his  ab- 
sence. If  he  sat  tight,  he  felt,  as  we  know,  that  the  fort  could 
not  stand  a  siege.  It  was  overtopped  by  the  sand  hills,  and 
water  would  have  to  be  carried  from  the  Rio  Grande,  a  mile 
and  a  half  to  west. 

.  .  .  Other  officers,  with  myself,  became  convinced  that  we 
must  be  eventually  compelled  to  surrender  if  we  remained  .  .  . 
that  our  only  hope  of  saving  the  command  from  capture  was  in 
reaching  some  other  military  post.  I  therefore  ordered  the  fort 
to  be  evacuated,  and  such  public  property  as  could  not  be 
transported  ...  to  be  destroyed  as  far  as  time  would  allow, 
and  at  1  o'clock  A.M.  on  the  27th  of  July  I  took  up  the  line  of 
march  for  Fort  Stanton . .  ,32 

The  Mesilla  Times  for  August  3rd,  1861,  reports  the 
destruction : 

.  .  .  much  valuable  property  and  munitions  of  war  .  .  . 
muskets,  clothing,  a  blacksmith's  shop,  bakery  and  one  of  the 
Quartermaster's  store  rooms  had  been  completely  burned  down. 
The  majority  of  the  buildings  were  uninjured,  and  can  be  imme- 
diately occupied  by  the  Confederate  forces.  The  Hospital  stores, 
medicines  and  furniture  were  most  completely  broken  up, 
and  nearly  all  the  arms  and  a  great  quantity  of  ammunition 
destroyed . .  .33 

Lynde  had  no  personal  knowledge  of  the  road  to  Fort 
Stanton,  but  it  was  reported  to  him  that  the  first  day's  march 
of  twenty  miles  would  bring  the  command  to  abundant  water, 
just  over  a  pass  through  the  mountains  to  the  east,  at  San 
Augustine  Springs. 

His  report  continues  with  a  description  of  the  march,  say- 
ing the  command  had  no  difficulty  until  daylight.  Then  the 

33.  Lydia  Spencer  Lane  found  Fort  Fillmore  almost  obliterated,  a  pile  of  adobe  dust, 
when  she  passed  the  site  in  1869  (7  married  a  soldier:  Phila.,  J.  B.  Lippincott,  1893). 
Today  irrigation  has  extended  cotton  fields  into  a  portion  of  the  post's  original  area,  and 
bulldozers,  in  setting  up  a  levee,  have  exposed  old  foundations  and  have  brought  broken 
floor  tiles  to  the  surface.  Much  broken  china  in  one  quarter  betrays  the  location  of  the 
mess  hall  and  kitchen,  and  horseshoes,  nails  and  ashes  indicate  where  the  blacksmith  shop 
once  stood.  Local  "fort-hunters"  have  found  innumerable  pre-1861  military  buttons, 
howitzer  fuses,  infantry  and  cavalry  hat  ornaments,  minie  bullets,  and  other  fascinating 
debris. 


18  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

sun  started  to  burn  cruelly.  Men  and  teams  began  to  tire. 
The  distance  turned  out  to  be  greater  "than  had  been  repre- 
sented." By  the  time  they  reached  the  pass,  men  were  falling 
everywhere  from  heat  and  thirst.  Lynde  now  faced  a  decision 
that  has  torn  commanders  ever  since  the  first  book  on  tactics. 
He  would  have  to  get  water  swiftly,  and  yet  this  meant  split- 
ting his  command. 

.  .  .  Up  to  this  time  there  was  no  indication  of  pursuit.  I 
now  determined  to  push  forward  with  the  mounted  force  to  the 
Springs,  and  return  with  water  for  the  suffering  men  in  the 
rear.  When  I  had  nearly  reached  the  Springs  word  was  brought 
to  me  that  a  mounted  force  was  approaching  . . .  believed  to  be 
Captain  Gibbs  .  .  .  that  supposition  was  confirmed  by  another 
express . . . 

...  I  found  the  supply  of  water  so  small  as  to  be  insufficient 
for  my  command.  After  procuring  all  the  water  that  could  be 
transported  by  the  men  with  me  I  started  back  to  the  main 
body.  After  riding  some  distance  I  became  so  much  exhausted 
that  I  could  not  sit  upon  my  horse,  and  the  command  proceeded 
without  me  ...  I  returned  to  the  Springs  . .  ,34 

Then  word  came  to  Lynde  that  a  large  force  of  Confed- 
erates was  approaching  his  rear  guard.  To  meet  this  new 
crisis,  he  found  that  no  more  than  a  hundred  of  his  infantry 
remained  fit  for  combat,  the  rest  having  collapsed,  "totally 
overpowered  by  the  intense  heat." 

The  Mesilla  Times  included  details  that  Lynde  was  too  far 
forward  to  have  known  about : 

.  .  .  the  way  to  the  Springs  had  the  appearance  of  a  com- 
plete rout  .  .  .  lined  with  guns,  cartridge  boxes,  etc.,  thrown 
away  by  the  fugitives.  Men  were  lying  by  the  roadside  almost 
dying  from  fatigue  and  thirst .  . .  friend  and  foe  suffered  most 
intensely  .  .  .  men  were  taken  prisoners  and  disarmed  in 
squads . .  ,85 

The  memoirs  of  a  private  soldier  on  the  Confederate  side 
contain  a  sidelight  on  the  retreat  unnoticed  by  anyone  else. 
Nevertheless  it  has  attracted  more  attention  from  historians 
than  has  Lynde's  purported  shelling  of  Mesilla's  women  and 


84.    Lynde  to  Anderson,  op.  cit. 
35.    Mesilla  Times,  August  3,  1861. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  19 

children.  For  that  reason,  if  for  no  other,  it  deserves  discus- 
sion here. 

Hank  Smith  makes  the  interesting  statement  that  he 
found  the  Union  soldiers  drunk.36 

Smith  had  been  a  member  of  an  Arizona  surveying  party 
recruited  en  masse  a  few  days  before  Lynde  marched  on  Me- 
silla.  While  Smith  calls  Lynde  "Lyons,"  there  is  no  mistaking 
that  in  spite  of  his  misspellings,  he  has  heard  most  of  the 
names  in  the  engagement.  His  account  sketches  homely  vig- 
nettes that  other  writers  overlooked  or  did  not  know  about, 
such  as  the  Union  infantry's  feast  on  "roasting  ears"  in  the 
fields  around  Mesilla  while  waiting  for  the  action  to  start. 
These  sketches  commend  Smith's  eye  for  detail,  but  his  sense 
of  the  time  interval  between  the  Mesilla  skirmish  and  the 
surrender  at  the  Springs  is  less  exact — probably  distorted  by 
an  excursion  in  which  he  shared,  procuring  horses  up  and 
down  the  valley  for  the  Confederate  cavalry.  To  Smith,  this 
took  about  five  days  to  accomplish,  although  less  than  forty- 
eight  hours  passed,  actually,  between  the  skirmish  and  the 
surrender. 

Smith  makes  other  contributions  plausible  in  the  general 
picture,  such  as  Lynde's  placing  cottonwood  pickets  across 
the  open  end  of  Fort  Fillmore's  parade  ground  to  render  the 
post  less  vulnerable.  But  Smith  puts  this  operation  between 
the  hour  of  Lynde's  return  from  Mesilla  and  the  hour  of  his 
retreat  toward  the  Springs,  an  insufficient  period  for  so  large 
a  job.  Lynde's  report  of  the  sandbag  project  seems  more  ad- 
missible. Smith  also  talks  about  Union  reinforcements  arriv- 
ing from  Fort  Stanton.  These  do  not  figure  in  the  official  re- 
ports, and  no  record  exists  of  their  having  been  dispatched. 

On  the  whole,  one  can  believe  that  Smith  was  present  dur- 
ing a  large  part  of  the  action,  or  at  least  in  the  neighborhood, 
and  that  he  heard  rumors  about  any  events  he  did  not  actually 
witness.  But  in  looking  back,  he  has  been  unable  to  separate 
memories  from  hearsay. 

Hank  Smith's  most  striking  contribution  to  the  general 
legend — which  he  alone  makes,  and  which  has  been  somewhat 


86.    "Memoirs  of  Hank  Smith,"  Panhandle-Plains  Historical  Review,  Vol.   I,   No. 
1  (1928),  p.  78. 


20  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

carelessly  perpetuated  by  historians37 — is  his  recollection  of 
drunkenness  among  Lynde's  retreating  troops. 

...  we  began  to  overtake  the  infantry  scattered  along  the 
road  in  little  bunches  . . .  We  would  stack  the  guns  and  take  all 
the  ammunition.  We  found  some  of  the  guns  loaded  with  whis- 
key and  a  good  portion  of  the  soldiers  drunk  and  begging  for 
water . . . 

If  this  were  true,  it  is  understandable  that  Union  officers 
omitted  it  from  their  reports.  However,  Baylor  could  have 
included  it,  but  did  not.  The  Mesilla  Times  is  oddly  silent  if 
the  incident  really  happened,  considering  its  satirical  treat- 
ment of  Fort  Fillmore's  garrison  on  other  occasions. 

The  Times  had  the  entire  Confederate  command  as  a 
source  for  material  unflattering  to  the  Union.  If  anyone  at 
all,  either  from  the  group  that  pursued  Lynde  or  from  the 
town  and  valley,  had  known  of  liquor  in  the  Union  muskets,  it 
is  difficult  to  imagine  the  Times  withholding  such  a  morsel 
from  a  gossip-hungry  countryside.  One  feels  forced  to  con- 
clude that  no  one,  not  even  Smith,  had  the  wit  to  invent  this 

37.  More  than  careless,  in  my  opinion,  and  even  slanderous,  is  William  A.  Keleher's 
treatment  of  this  supposed  incident,  in  his  Turmoil  in  New  Mexico,  p.  150.  The  extent 
of  Keleher's  embroidery  can  be  indicated  only  through  reprinting  his  vivid  description 
in  full.  Sounding  like  an  eyewitness  with  his  wealth  of  detail,  he  writes  as  follows : 

"Word  was  whispered  about  the  barracks  that  boxes  of  hospital  brandy,  and  kegs 
of  medicinal  whiskey,  in  goodly  number,  were  to  be  abandoned.  As  the  soldiers  appraised 
the  situation,  abandonment  of  a  military  post  under  orders  was  one  thing,  but  abandon- 
ment of  high  class  liquor  was  a  much  more  serious  matter,  one  that  required  consideration 
and  reflection.  The  soldiers  met  the  situation  sensibly,  and  in  the  beginning,  with  discre- 
tion. First  one  trooper,  then  another,  and  then  many,  took  a  moderate  swig  of  the  soon- 
to-be-abandoned  liquor,  then  each  helped  himself  to  a  drink  that  seemed  more  appro- 
priate to  the  occasion.  One  sergeant  of  the  "old  army"  decided  that  a  drop  of  brandy,  or 
perhaps  two  or  more,  on  the  road  to  Fort  Stanton  might  be  eminently  fitting  under  the 
circumstances.  Pouring  the  water  out  of  his  canteen,  he  replaced  it  with  liquor.  Others, 
recognizing  the  sergeant's  commendable  conduct,  substituted  liquor  for  water  in  their 
canteens.  But  on  the  cross  country  march  from  Fort  Fillmore  to  San  Augustine  Springs, 
soldiers  with  liquor  in  their  canteens  instead  of  water  suffered  severely  from  thirst." 

As  his  source,  Keleher  cites  the  Las  Vegas  Gazette  for  August  25,  1877.  He  does  not 
say  whether  he  means  Las  Vegas,  Nevada,  or  Las  Vegas,  New  Mexico.  In  either  case, 
he  devotes  the  better  part  of  a  page  to  adapting  a  story  that  appeared  in  a  newspaper 
hundreds  of  miles  from  the  scene  and  sixteen  years  after  the  event. 

H.  H.  Bancroft,  while  less  lyrical  than  Keleher,  nevertheless  adds  the  support  of  his 
reputation  to  this  legend,  although  he  shows  nothing  to  confirm  his  remarks.  He  says : 
"...  as  is  stated,  the  men  had  been  given  all  the  whiskey  they  wanted,  and  were  mostly 
drunk.  .  ."  As  is  stated  by  whom?  The  men  were  given  whiskey  by  whom?  (History  of 
Arizona  and  New  Mexico,  San  Francisco,  The  History  Company,  1889,  p.  699,  n.  14 ).  As 
far  as  I  have  been  able  to  discover,  the  original  responsibility  for  this  story  still  rests 
with  Hank  Smith  and  his  Memoirs. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  21 

story  at  the  time  of  the  surrender.  Smith  reserved,  or  manu- 
factured, the  story  for  his  memoirs.  Perhaps  it  arose  from 
some  other  of  his  adventures,  at  another  place,  another  time. 
Of  his  experiences  in  the  Mesilla  Valley,  we  cannot  be  wholly 
certain  as  to  what  he  really  saw  there. 

For  lack  of  corroborating  witnesses,  Hank  Smith's  story 
must  be  shelved,  although  the  surgeon,  McKee,  by  his  omis- 
sion of  it,  prevents  its  final  burial.  McKee  made  much  of  his 
destruction  of  hospital  stores  as  ordered  by  Lynde.38  He  de- 
scribes this  destruction  as  total,  even  though  his  commander 
stipulated  that  no  fire  be  used.  He  cites  the  Mesilla  Times,  to 
prove  his  own  efficiency,  for  the  Times  compared  the  hospital 
wreckage  with  the  small  damage  throughout  the  rest  of  the 
fort.  Certainly  in  all  that  glass-breaking  (signs  of  which  re- 
main to  this  day) ,  the  medicinal  whiskey,  rum  and  wine  must 
have  perished.  If  Hank  Smith  is  accepted  as  a  truthful  re- 
porter, then  McKee,  at  the  very  least,  is  either  a  forgetful 
man  in  this  instance,  or  a  protector  of  "as  good  and  true  a 
set  of  soldiers  as  ever  fired  a  musket,"39  whom  he  felt  had 
been  betrayed  by  Lynde.  On  the  other  hand,  he  could  be  mask- 
ing by  silence  his  own  neglect,  or  even  his  disobedience,  if  he 
let  the  liquor  get  into  the  hands  of  the  troops.40 

Drunk  or  not,  Major  Lynde's  command  had  fallen  into 
helpless  disorganization.  Lynde  sensed  this,  although  prob- 
ably not  completely,  as  he  rested  at  the  Springs. 

Now  appeared  a  new  actor  in  the  Major's  personal  trag- 
edy :  a  man  who  was  to  cause  him  more  anguish  in  later  years 
than  the  pursuing  rebels  would  cause  in  the  next  half  hour. 

Captain  Alfred  Gibbs  of  the  Mounted  Rifles  had  beenf 
herding  beef  cattle  southward  from  Fort  Craig  to  Fort  Fill- 

38.  In  the  Narrative,  p.  18,  McKee  says  he  refused  to  accept  the  verbal  order  which 
Lieutenant  Brooks  relayed  to  him  from  Lynde,  because  he  would  have  to  report  to  the 
Surgeon  General  the  disposition  of  the  stores.  Brooks  thereupon  sat  down  in  McKee's 
quarters  and  wrote  the  order  out. 

39.  Narrative,  p.  17. 

40.  This  is  only  a  possibility,  and  even  suggesting  it  may  be  unfair  to  McKee, 
considering  his  creditable  service  with  the  Army  up  to  his  Fort  Fillmore  assignment,  and 
after  it  for  the  balance  of  the  war.  But  however  thin,  the  possibility  is  there  and  I 
cannot  ignore  it  entirely.  McKee's  extravagance  in  praising  the  troops,  and  stressing 
his  own  efficiency  in  all  matters,  measured  beside  his  further  extravagance  in  his  abuse 
of  Lynde,  should  convince  any  careful  reader  that  McKee  is  not  telling  the  whole  story. 
There  appears  to  be  a  disturbed  current  of  emotion  underrunning  the  facts  as  McKee 
saw  them — emotion  whose  cause  does  not  appear  in  the  facts  as  observed  by  others. 


22  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

more.  Lynde  had  sent  Gibbs  warning  to  stay  away,  after  the 
Mesilla  skirmish.41 

Disregarding  this  message,  Gibbs  had  swung  widely  to 
approach  Fort  Fillmore  from  the  side  opposite  to  the  one  that 
faced  Mesilla,  hoping  to  get  in  unobserved.  Meanwhile,  Lynde 
had  begun  his  retreat.  Gibbs'  detachment  suddenly  came  upon 
the  middle  of  Lynde's  exhausted  column,  as  it  straggled  to- 
ward the  pass.  As  McKee  describes  this  encounter,  Gibbs 
"unfortunately  joined  us  at  this  time,  fell  into  the  trap,  and 
was  compelled  to  accept  our  fate.  .  .  ." 

That  Gibbs  fell  into  a  trap  is  doubtful  because  of  his  rec- 
ord.42 He  was  a  brave,  professional  cavalry  leader  with 
enough  field  experience  to  read  the  signs  at  once.  He  dashed 
boldly  into  the  trap  and,  by  his  own  account  and  McKee's,  put 


41.  Gibbs  reached  Point  of  Rocks,  on  the  Jornada  del  Muerto,  on  the  night  of  the 
23rd.  On  the  morning  of  the  26th,  he  encountered  Captain  Lane  of  the  Mounted  Rifles, 
conducting  a  wagon  train  from  Fort  Fillmore  north  to  Fort  Craig,  accompanied  by  Dr. 
Steck,  the  Indian  agent.  They  warned  Gibbs  of  the  proximity  of  the  Texans,  for  they 
had  left  Fort  Fillmore  on  the  24th,   at  which  time  the  Texans   had   been   discovered 
marching  to  Mesilla  from  El  Paso. 

The  wagon  train  here  is  the  "commissary  train"  Lynde  was  to  mention  as  the 
core  of  his  strategy  in  attacking  Mesilla,  stated  in  his  petition  to  President  Lincoln  on 
Christmas  Eve.  See  p.  28. 

Lydia  Spencer  Lane,  Captain  Lane's  wife,  reports  (op.  cit.)  the  meeting  with  Gibbs, 
after  telling  how  she  and  her  husband  had  sold  their  furniture  and  china  before  starting 
north  along  the  desolate  Jornada  to  his  new  post.  Her  most  startling  statement  is  that 
a  letter  she  wrote  to  an  Andrew  Porter,  which  Porter  telegraphed  to  Washington,  was 
the  "first  intimation"  the  War  Department  received  of  Lynde's  surrender. 

At  Lane's  request,  Gibbs  stayed  by  him  all  day  of  the  26th,  to  protect  him  from 
possible  Confederate  attack,  and  then  started  at  sunset  toward  Fort  Fillmore. 

42.  According  to  Cullum,  Gibbs  went  from  West  Point  to  the  Mounted  Rifles,  serving 
first  at  Jefferson  Barracks  in  1846.  From  there  he  proceeded  directly  to  the  Mexican  War 
and  was  wounded  at  the  battle  of  Cerro  Gordo  in   April,   1847.   He  was   immediately 
promoted  to  Brevet  2nd  Lieutenant  for  gallant  and  meritorious  conduct.   By  August, 
1847,  he  was  back  in  the  fighting,  and  took  part  in  the  engagements  at  Contreras,  Churu- 
busco  (in  Kearny's  charge  on  the  San  Antonio  Garita),  Chapultepec,  and  in  the  capture 
of  Mexico  City.  After  the  war  he  served  in  the  Pacific  Division,  the  Department  of 
Texas,  at  Fort  Fillmore    (1856-57),  scouting  against  the  Apaches    (by  whom  he  was 
severely  wounded),  and  other  frontier  duties.  He  achieved  his  captaincy  in  May,  1861, 
and  was  assigned  to  the  commissary  department,  on  which  duty  he  had  served  less  than 
two  months  when  he  started  down  to  Fort  Fillmore  with  the  beef  cattle  for  Lynde's 
garrison. 

General  Dabney  Herndon  Maury  records  (in  Recollections  of  a  Virginian:  N.Y., 
Chas.  Scribner's  Sons,  1894,  p.  118)  that  Gibbs,  pursuing  Apaches,  was  ".  .  .  desperately 
wounded  ...  at  the  conclusion  of  a  most  energetic  pursuit  and  action  which  had  been  a 
complete  success  .  .  ."  The  details  of  Gibbs'  career,  and  the  tone  of  his  dispatches,  indi- 
cate energy  and  action  throughout.  The  contrast  in  temperaments  and  performances  of 
Gibbs  and  Lynde  are  striking  indeed.  The  dashing  young  cavalry  captain,  battle-scarred 
and  in  a  rush  toward  further  war,  must  have  felt  scant  sympathy  for  the  older,  less 
imaginative  infantry  major. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  23 

all  his  energies  into  keeping  it  from  closing  on  the  collapsing 
Fort  Fillmore  command.  Taking  his  cavalry  rapidly  along 
the  line  of  march,  he  caught  up  with  Lynde  at  the  Springs. 
His  report  of  the  day's  subsequent  action,  added  to  Lynde's, 
gives  a  vivid  picture  of  the  retreat's  last  stages. 

. . .  Reported  to  Major  Lynde  and  asked  for  orders.  He  told 
me  that  there  were  two  companies  of  the  Seventh  Infantry  in 
rear  guard,  and  that  they,  with  the  Rifles,  would  protect  the 
rear.  Filled  my  canteen  at  the  Springs;  rejoined  Major  Lynde 
about  2  miles  from  it,  returning  to  the  front .  .  .  He  told  me  to 
protect  the  rear  ...  as  long  as  I  saw  fit,  and  then  return  to  the 
camp  at  the  Springs.  Rejoined  the  mounted  force  . . .  formed  at 
the  foot  of  the  hill  in  front  of  the  enemy  .  .  .  infantry  rear 
guard  was  completely  broken  down  ...  I  had  nothing  but  the 
mounted  force  to  rely  upon  . .  ,43 

Gibbs  found  the  road  blocked  by  baggage  wagons  filled 
with  stores,  women  and  children.  Howitzers  were  fastened 
behind  these  wagons.  Gibbs  sent  men  to  get  the  howitzers  into 
action,  but  no  ammunition  could  be  found  for  them.  His  sev- 
enty men,  lightly  armed,  faced  three  hundred,  and  Gibbs  saw 
the  terrain  as  favorable  for  no  more  than  a  single  charge. 

...  In  order  to  gain  time,  I  kept  deploying  into  line,  and  by 
rapid  formations  gaining  ground  by  our  superior  drill,  to  allow 
the  main  force  now  approaching  the  Springs  ...  to  form  before 

1  reached  them.  I  then  rode  rapidly  to  the  front,  and  reported 
to  Major  Lynde  with  my  command  that  the  enemy  were  about 

2  miles  in  the  rear  and  rapidly  advancing.  I  asked  him  where 
I  should  take  my  position.  He  told  me  that  I  might  water  my 
command  and  horses  .  .  .  while  I  was  doing  so,  Major  Lynde 
sent  me  an  order  not  to  move  .  .  .  sent  me  word  later  that  I 
could  leave  for  Fort  Stanton  if  I  chose.  Before  I  could  mount 
I  received  another  order  not  to  move  from  camp.  I  went  towards 
him  .  .  .  saw  him  in  conversation  with  two  mounted  officers, 
whom  I  did  not  know  ...  I  heard  Major  Lynde  say,  'I  agree  to 
these  terms'  .  .  .  Nearly  every  officer  protested  earnestly,  and 
even  violently,  against  this  base  surrender  .  .  ,44 

Then  Gibbs  describes  the  "altercation  by  Major  Lynde's 
subordinates"  becoming  so  strenuous  that  the  Confederate 


43.  OR  I,  4,  p.  10. 

44.  OR  I,  4,  pp.  10-11. 


24  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

commander,  Baylor,  asked  who  was  in  charge.  McKee  took 
part  in  this  altercation,  according  to  his  official  statement : 

...  I,  among  other  officers,  entered  my  solemn  protest 
against  the  surrender,  but  were  peremptorily  told  by  Major 
Lynde  that  he  was  the  commanding  officer . . . 

McKee  cannot  resist  anticipating  his  later  role  as  chron- 
icler of  melodrama,  even  in  a  supposedly  factual  report  to  an 
exclusively  military  audience.  He  continues : 

...  To  see  old  soldiers  and  strong  men  weep  like  children, 
men  who  had  faced  the  battle's  storm  of  the  Mexican  war,  is  a 
sight  that  I  hope  I  may  never  again  be  present  at.  A  braver 
and  truer  command  could  not  be  found  than  that  which  has  in 
this  case  been  made  a  victim  of  cowardice  and  imbecility  .  .  ,45 

Seventeen  years  later,  in  his  published  narrative,  he  was 
even  more  struck  by  the  splendor  of  the  boys  in  blue  at  their 
last  stand.  He  remembered,  or  found  in  his  notes,  quite  dif- 
ferent men  from  the  victims  of  heat  and  thirst  that  Gibbs 
saw  lying  under  bushes,  unable  to  rise ;  that  Baylor  reported 
unfit  for  combat ;  that  Hank  Smith  found  loaded  with  whis- 
key. To  McKee,  ".  .  .  at  least  five  hundred  infantry  and 
cavalry,  trained,  disciplined  and  well-drilled  .  .  ."contrasted 
strikingly  with  the  ".  .  .  badly  armed  .  .  .  irregular  com- 
mand of  Texans."  As  for  his  protests  to  Lynde  with  other 
officers,  he  remembers  them  as  ".  .  .  farcical  and  ludicrous 
in  the  extreme  .  .  .  too  late  .  .  .  ought  to  have  been  done 
before  .  .  ,"46 

In  minute  details  of  happenings  before,  during  and  after 
the  two  days  of  skirmish,  retreat  and  surrender,  the  Narra- 
tive displays  great  certainty.  But  McKee  questions  his  mem- 
ory on  the  number  of  Union  companies  captured — one  of 
those  large,  familiar  facts  that  should  easily  be  retained  by 
one  so  close  to  the  affair,  so  convinced  of  his  own  Napoleonic 
omniscience  in  military  matters. 

Lynde  took  a  clearer,  less  emotional  view,  stating  a  simple 
case  to  Canby : 

.  .  .  Under  the  circumstances  I  considered  our  case  hope- 
less; that  it  was  worse  than  useless  to  resist;  that  honor  did 


45.  McKee  to  the  Surgeon  General,  August  16,  1861.  OR  I,  4,  p.  11. 

46.  Narrative,  pp.  21-22. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  25 

not  demand  the  sacrifice  of  blood  after  the  terrible  suffering 
that  our  troops  had  already  undergone,  and  when  that  sacrifice 
would  be  totally  useless  . . . 

The  strength  of  my  command  at  the  time  of  surrender  was, 
Mounted  Rifles,  95  rank  and  file  and  2  officers  .  .  .  seven  com- 
panies of  the  Seventh  Infantry,  with  8  officers  . .  ,47 

At  this  point,  for  the  first  and  only  time  in  his  dispatches, 
Lynde's  personality  seems  to  appear  momentarily  from  be- 
hind the  formal,  military  report : 

.  .  .  Surrounded  by  open  and  secret  enemies,  no  reliable 
information  could  be  obtained,  and  disaffection  prevailing  in 
my  own  command,  to  what  extent  it  was  impossible  to  ascer- 
tain, but  much  increased,  undoubtedly,  by  the  conduct  of  officers 
who  left  their  post  without  authority.48  My  position  has  been 
one  of  great  difficulty,  and  has  ended  in  the  misfortune  of  sur- 
rendering my  command  to  the  enemy.  The  Texan  troops  acted 
with  great  kindness  toward  our  men,  exerting  themselves  in 
carrying  water  to  the  famishing  ones  in  the  rear;  yet  it  was 
two  days  before  the  infantry  could  move  from  the  camp,  and 
then  only  with  the  assistance  of  their  captors  . . . 

Lynde  and  his  officers  and  men,  except  for  a  few  who  then 
and  there  either  joined  the  Confederates  or  chose  military  im- 
prisonment, were  paroled  out  of  the  war.  Baylor  gave  them 
enough  rifles  and  food  to  get  them  north  through  Indian  coun- 
try to  Canby's  headquarters  at  Santa  Fe.  From  there,  Lynde's 
command  broke  up  in  scattered  assignments  to  non-belliger- 
ent duties. 

Lynde  started  the  long  journey  eastward  to  meet  certain 
punishment.  Aged  55,  he  was  not  yet  an  old  soldier,  yet  he 
had  come  through  a  long  and  uneventful  career  to  within 

47.  OR  I,  4,  p.  6.  Captain  J.  H.  Potter's  official  recapitulation  of  the  troops  sur- 
rendered  (OR  I,  4,  p.  15)   lists  11  commissioned  officers  and  399  enlisted  men  including 
non-commissioned  officers  paroled ;  16  taken  by  the  Confederates  as  prisoners  of  war ; 
26  deserters ;  and  "40  available  for  service,  not  paroled."  This  totals  492  men,  somewhat 
less  than  the  "700  effective  men"  referred  to  in  the  Mesilla  Times  (August  3,  1861),  or 
the  "between  five  and  six  hundred  veterans"  of  McKee's  Narrative,  and  somewhat  more 
than  the  "three  officers  and  300  men"  of  Hank  Smith's  Memoirs. 

48.  Whether  Lynde  refers  to  officers  who  resigned  and  passed  through  his  post 
on  their  way  to  the  Confederacy,  or  to  officers  in  his  immediate  command  who  forsook 
their  duties  without  leave,  is  not  evident  in  this  writing.  In  Lynde's  statement  routed 
by  President  Lincoln  to  the  Judge  Advocate  General  on  January  8,   1862,  he  names 
Captains  Garland  and  Jones  in  the  latter  connection.   As  for  the  former  possibility, 
see  Canby  to  Adjutant  General,  March  16,  1866,  summarized  in  this  essay,  beginning 
on  page  25. 


26  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

sight  of  honorable,  pensioned  retirement.  But  if  he  had 
counted  on  this,  the  dream  had  burned  away  in  the  desert  on 
the  road  to  San  Augustine  Springs.  Now,  even  as  the  mesquite 
and  wind-blasted  hills  sank  behind  him,  the  angry  repetition 
of  his  name  began  sounding  in  every  quarter. 

Sometime  in  October,  the  Reverend  Doctor  Cressy  of 
Stapleton,  Staten  Island,  got  a  letter  from  his  son,  Edward, 
two  thousand  miles  away  at  Fort  Craig.  Edward  described 
Lynde  as  surrendering  in  the  "most  disgraceful  and  cowardly 
manner."  The  young  man  added  that  he  was  "perfectly  dis- 
gusted with  the  whole  affair,"  and  called  Lynde  "that  infernal 
coward."49 

Bitterness  threw  out  tentacles  like  a  poisonous  vine.  The 
New  York  Herald  Tribune  for  September  7th  picked  up  an 
August  llth  report  from  Santa  Fe,  which  in  turned  picked 
up  a  dispatch  just  arrived  from  El  Paso,  signed  "A. 
Deckarle."  He  says  that  if  the  surrender  story  he  has  heard 
is  true,  it  is  "the  most  shameful  thing  ever  done  by  an  officer 
of  the  United  States  army." 

On  September  21st,  the  Herald  Tribune  quoted  another 
Santa  Fe  report,  this  one  dated  August  18th.  "Major  Lynde, 
I  understand,  was  here  yesterday.  Why  he  has  not  been  ar- 
rested and  court-martialled  on  account  of  the  shameful  sur- 
render of  Fort  Fillmore,  I  cannot  understand.  .  .  ."  Then  the 
New  York  paper  reprints  items  from  the  Santa  Fe  Gazette 
of  August  17th.  One  of  these  raises  a  lonely  voice  in  Lynde's 
behalf:  "It  appears  .  .  .  that  the  conduct  of  Major  Lynde 
was  not  so  bad  in  this  affair  as  it  was  at  first  represented. 
.  .  ."  The  Gazette  blames  him  for  a  lack  of  military  skill, 
and  failure  to  prepare  his  troops  sufficiently  for  the  retreat 
from  Fort  Fillmore — as  opposed,  we  must  assume,  to  treach- 
ery or  cowardice  previously  reported. 

On  September  27th,  Secretary  of  War  Cameron  got  a  mes- 


49.  OR  II,  3,  pp.  33-34.  Although  he  had  been  in  a  few  Indian  battles,  the  Mesilla 
skirmish  was  Edward  F.  Cressy's  first  taste  of  white  man's  war.  He  was  graduated 
from  West  Point  in  1858,  nineteenth  in  his  class  of  twenty-seven.  He  was  made  a  1st 
Lieutenant,  Mounted  Rifles,  less  than  two  months  before  the  surrender.  Paroled  until 
late  summer  of  1862,  he  was  exchanged  and  reentered  the  war  as  a  captain  in  the  3rd 
Cavalry,  and  was  brevetted  at  the  close  of  the  war  to  major's  and  lieutenant-colonel's 
rank.  He  served  again  in  New  Mexico,  at  Fort  Bayard  after  1866,  and  was  honorably 
mustered  out  in  1871.  He  died  in  1899. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  27 

sage  from  Fort  Fauntleroy,  New  Mexico,  containing  these 
words :  ".  .  .  disgraceful  surrender  of  old  Lynde,  superannu- 
ated and  unfit  for  service,  of  a  U.  S.  force  of  750  men  to  350 
Arizona  cut-throats.  .  .  ."50 

On  November  7th,  the  New  York  Times  said  that  Captain 
Gibbs  and  Lieutenants  McNally  and  Cressy  had  reached  St. 
Louis  with  ".  .  .  one  hundred  and  three  of  the  Seventh  Regi- 
ment .  .  .  whom  Major  Lynd  [sic]  so  ingloriously  surren- 
dered." The  day  this  story  appeared  in  New  York,  Gibbs  filed 
a  request  in  St.  Louis  for  a  court  of  inquiry  into  the  surrender, 
in  the  name  of  all  the  officers  of  his  own  command,  and  par- 
ticularly concerning  his  part  in  the  proceedings.51 

Two  days  later,  Lynde's  name  again  appeared  in  the  New 
York  Times:  ".  .  .  surrendered  his  command  so  ingloriously 
.  .  .  arrived  at  Hannibal  under  arrest.  He  was  not  ironed, 
as  he  deserved  to  have  been."52  What  had  begun  as  a  snow- 
flake  in  the  storm  of  war  had  become  a  snowball,  rolled  by 
busy  hands  to  a  mountain  top  and  about  to  flatten  the  Major. 

The  House  of  Representatives,  on  December  4th,  adopted 
a  resolution  to  request  a  report  from  the  Secretary  of  War 
on  what  measures  had  been  taken  ".  .  .  to  expose  and  pun- 
ish such  of  the  officers  now  on  parole  as  were  guilty  of  treason 
or  cowardice  in  that  surrender,  and  relieve  from  suspicion 
such  as  were  free  from  blame."53 

In  his  answer,  dated  December  12th,  the  Secretary  en- 
closed a  report  from  the  Adjutant  General  which  said  that 
Lynde  had  been  dropped  from  the  Army  rolls  on  November 
25th,  and  that  no  other  officer  was  believed  at  fault.54 

In  the  closing  days  of  1861,  the  New  York  Times  was  still 
pointing  to  the  forts  "disgracefully  surrendered,"55  and 
specifically  to  Fort  Fillmore,  as  ".  .  .  that  post  .  .  .traitor- 
ously surrendered  by  Col.  Lynde.  .  .  ,"56  Promoted  by  a 
newspaper,  but  stripped  of  his  honor,  career  and  future  se- 
curity by  his  government,  Lynde  must  have  looked  toward  the 

50.  Wm.  Need  to  Cameron,  September  27,  1861.  OR  I,  50,  Vol.  1,  p.  639. 

51.  Gibbs  to  Ass't.  Adj.  Gen.,  November  7,  1861.  OR  I,  4,  p.  9. 

52.  N.  Y.  Times,  November  9,  1861,  p.  4. 

53.  OR  I,  4,  p.  15. 

54.  Ibid. 

55.  N.Y.  Times,  December  26,  1861,  p.3. 

56.  Op.  Cit.,  December  28,  1861,  p.  1,  coL  1. 


28  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

new  year  with  deep  despair.  His  judges  had  forgotten  him  in 
the  press  of  war,  but  his  accusers  had  not.  Their  anger  would 
dog  him  through  the  early  months  of  1862. 

Lynde's  eastward  progress  had  taken  him,  under  arrest, 
to  Jeiferson  Barracks,  Missouri,  by  early  December.  On  the 
5th,  he  had  written  to  the  Hon.  H.  M.  Rice  in  Washington, 
asking  for  help  toward  a  fair  trial  "by  my  'peers"  and  deny- 
ing intention  or  action  of  treason  toward  his  government. 
Lynde  also  denied  having  surrendered  his  command  to  an 
inferior  force.  "I  have  not  served  .  .  .  the  United  States  for 
over  thirty  four  years  and  most  of  that  time  on  the  extremest 
frontier,  to  turn  traitor  at  this  late  day.  .  .  ."" 

By  December  24th,  Lynde  had  gotten  to  Washington.  On 
that  day,  writing  with  what  appears  to  be  either  a  sick  or 
senile  hand,  he  petitioned  President  Lincoln58  for  restoration 
to  rank  to  enable  him  to  be  tried  by  a  court  of  inquiry  or  court- 
martial,59  ".  .  .  confident  of  my  ability  to  prove  to  any  un- 
prejudiced tribunal  that  I  had  authority  to  abandon  that 
post.  .  .  ."  Lincoln  transmitted  Lynde's  seven-page  state- 
ment, apparently  enclosed  with  the  petition,  to  the  Judge  Ad- 
vocate General,  with  a  note  requesting  a  review  of  the  case. 
The  statement  is  not  significantly  different  from  Lynde's  of- 
ficial dispatches  to  Canby  in  its  history  of  the  New  Mexico 
events  surrounding  him,  except  in  one  new  detail.  Lynde  now 
was  saying  that  when  the  Texans  appeared  in  Mesilla,  he 
heard  that  they  intended  to  pursue  a  commissary  train  he  had 
sent  to  Fort  Craig  several  days  before.60  He  thereupon  de- 
cided to  "make  a  demonstration  in  the  direction  of  Mesilla," 
to  prevent  the  pursuit  of  the  train  and  to  try  the  strength  of 
the  Texans.  His  ".  .  .  calculations  all  proved  true  for  I  was 
afterwards  informed  that  when  I  approached  the  town  they 
were  just  starting  a  part  of  their  command  to  pursue  the 
train  and  their  plan  was,  if  they  were  driven  from  the  town 
to  make  a  dash  upon  the  fort,  which  they  might  have  done 


57.  Lynde  to  H.  M.  Rice,  December  5,   1861.  Consolidated  file   107-1861,   RG   153, 
Office  of  the  Advocate  General  (National  Archives) . 

58.  Lynde  to  the  President  (File  107-1861). 

59.  According  to  Lynde's  "Appointments,  Commissions  and  Personal  File"   (L736- 
ACP-1866),  National  Archives,  these  were  never  granted. 

60.  See  note  41. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  29 

as  they  were  all  mounted  and  I  had  but  about  50  mounted 
men.  As  it  was  the  train  escaped.  .  .  ."61 

This  puts  a  light  on  the  whole  Mesilla  action  that  con- 
ceivably might  have  saved  Lynde  much  anguish  if  he  had  ad- 
vanced it  earlier.  His  reevaluation  of  the  Texan  strength  in 
this  statement  is  probably  less  admissible,  in  view  of  his  for- 
mer official  reports.  He  now  thinks  Baylor  had  about  five  hun- 
dred and  fifty  men  to  his  own  five  hundred,  and  that  they 
would  have  increased  to  eight  hundred  and  fifty  with  rein- 
forcements from  El  Paso.  He  says  that  Gibbs  reported  eight 
companies  of  mounted  rebels  to  him  at  the  Springs.  A  note 
by  someone  unidentified,  at  the  end  of  Lynde's  statement,  says 
that  Texan  regiments  were  known  to  have  one  hundred  men 
each. 

Lynde's  petition  is  mentioned  in  an  opinion  delivered  in 
January,  1862,  by  the  Judge  Advocate,  J.  F.  Lee.  He  says 
Lynde  has  alleged  he  had  authority  to  abandon  Fort  Fillmore, 
that  the  circumstances  justified  it,  that  he  did  not  surrender 
to  an  inferior  force,  and  that  he  protests  his  loyalty.  In  Lee's 
view,  the  charges — including  surrendering  "disgracefully 
and  shamefully,"  and  "misbehavior  before  the  enemy"  be- 
cause of  retreating  after  demanding  an  unconditional  sur- 
render— are  punishable  with  death;  but  he  notes  that  the 
more  lenient  course  of  discharging  Lynde  has  been  taken. 
The  Judge  Advocate  says  his  department  is  satisfied  as  to 
the  facts  and  previous  judgment,  adding  that  Lynde  may  be 
restored  by  the  President  with  the  Senate's  approval.  He  does 
not  think  the  previous  judgment  is  likely  to  be  reversed.62 

Meanwhile,  Lynde's  surrender  had  put  an  irksome,  even 
though  temporary,  curb  on  the  careers  of  several  young  offi- 
cers of  his  former  command.  Captain  Alfred  Gibbs,  f rettingly 
belligerent  in  the  only  manner  possible  because  of  his  parole, 
poured  his  energies  onto  official  paper  to  get  himself  back  into 
the  war.  Shortly  he  would  be  exchanged  and  go  off  to  Virginia, 
where  the  little  depots  with  the  great,  bloody  names  would 
join  the  Mexican  battles  among  his  citations.  He  would  move 
up  rapidly,  as  he  always  had,  to  become  a  Brevet  Major  Gen- 


si.    Lynde  to  the  President,  op.  cit. 
62.    OR  II,  3,  pp.  189-190. 


30  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

eral  by  the  time  of  Appomattox,  go  west  again  to  frontier 
duty  and  die,  still  young,  still  fuming  perhaps,  in  Kansas  in 
1868.63  But  now  in  February  and  March  of  1862  he  was  pull- 
ing at  every  string  to  save  himself,  as  he  saw  it,  from  un- 
merited disgrace. 

Taking  his  case  directly  to  the  Secretary  of  War,  he  en- 
closed in  his  letter  a  list  of  his  command,  ".  .  .  ignominiously 
surrendered  by  Maj.  Isaac  Lynde."  He  asked  that  he  and  his 
men  be  released  from  ".  .  .  the  ignominious  position  in  which 
we  have  been  placed  by  the  cowardice  of  our  commanding 
officer.  .  .  ,"64  While  Gibbs  can  hardly  be  blamed  for  continu- 
ing to  stir  this  troublesome  brew  of  anguish  and  accusation, 
his  repetition  of  certain  phrases  seems  to  hammer  them  out 
in  letters  of  iron.  They  leave  their  impress  on  the  reports  and 
letters  of  other  people  prodded  by  Gibbs.  Even  the  newspa- 
pers pick  them  up.  Ignominious  surrender,  for  example,  fig- 
ures so  frequently  that  coincidence  begins  to  seem  unlikely. 
It  could  be  questioned  whether  Gibbs  was  reading  the  news- 
papers or  the  newspapers  were  reading  Gibbs. 

He  sent  a  list  of  his  paroled  command  to  the  Department 
of  Missouri,  and  referred  inevitably  to  the  ".  .  .  ignominious 
surrender  of  Maj.  Isaac  Lynde."65  He  applied  to  a  congress- 
man to  aid  him  toward  exchange,66  again  mentioning  the  ig- 
nominious surrender,  and  this  note  was  sent  along  to  Stanton 
wi th  the  comment :  ".  .  .  seems  they  were  treacherously  sur- 
rendered by  Maj.  Isaac  Lynde.  .  .  ."67  A  second  enclosure 
was  a  letter  from  a  man  in  Detroit,  where  Gibbs  was  stationed 
on  parole.  The  letter  calls  Gibbs'  command  "...  a  portion 
of  the  force  so  shamefully  surrendered  by  Colonel  Lynde."68 
Friends  who  knew  nothing  of  the  surrender  except  what 
Gibbs  had  told  them,  obligingly  contributed  to  the  destruc- 
tion of  Lynde's  name. 

On  November  27th,  1866,  five  years  from  the  day  he  was 
dropped  from  the  Army,  Lynde  was  restored  to  his  former 
rank  by  order  of  President  Johnson,  and  retired. 

63.  Cullum,  Register,  p.  168. 

64.  Gibbs  to  Stanton,  February  22,  1862.  OR  II,  3,  pp.  298-99. 
66.    Gibbs  to  N.  H.  McLean,  March  4,  1862.  OR  II,  3,  pp.  346-7. 

66.  Gibbs  to  Howard,  March  4,  1862.  OR  II,  3,  p.  369. 

67.  Howard  to  Stanton,  March  11,  1862.  OR  II,  8,  p.  368. 

68.  Wm.  Gray  to  Howard,  March  5,  1862.  OR  II,  3,  p.  369. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  31 

Lynde's  old  commander,  Canby,  had  much  to  do  with  this. 
Apparently  in  answer  to  a  request  from  the  Adjutant  Gen- 
eral's Office,  he  listed  what  he  thought  were  the  extenuating 
circumstances  of  Lynde's  surrender  at  San  Augustine 
Springs,  first  giving  his  opinion  that  Lynde's  force  had  been 
"sufficiently  ample,"  and  that  Lynde  should  not  have  aban- 
doned Fort  Fillmore  until  the  troops  from  Arizona  had  gotten 
safely  out. 

While  he  does  not  excuse  Lynde,  Canby  points  out  certain 
factors  that  he  feels  had  influence  on  Lynde's  failure.  First 
was  the  dissatisfaction  among  the  troops.  They  had  not  been 
paid  in  ten  months,  ".  .  .  in  consequence  of  the  desertion 
and  defalcation  of  a  paymaster."  Canby  next  tells  of  the  dis- 
loyalty around  Lynde,  and  the  effect  of  secessionist  pressure 
on  the  soldiery.  Deserting  officers  tried  to  demoralize  the 
troops.  A  rebel  judge  in  El  Paso  let  his  opinion  be  known  that 
since  the  Union  had  been  dissolved,  no  officers  or  men  were 
bound  to  it  by  a  former  oath  of  allegiance.  Then  Canby  goes 
on  to  emphasize  the  blow  to  the  department  caused  by  the 
discovery  that  Colonel  W.  W.  Loring,  its  highest  ranking 
officer  from  whom  Canby  took  over  the  Department  of  New 
Mexico,  had  been  in  correspondence  with  the  Confederates 
before  his  resignation. 

Canby  adds  that  two  of  Lynde's  officers  and  several  men 
deserted  just  before  the  engagement  with  the  enemy  at  Me- 
silla.  The  effect  upon  Lynde's  mind  was  still  further  in- 
creased, says  Canby,  by  Lynde's  suspicion  that  his  own  men 
had  fired  upon  him. 

.  .  .  From  that  moment  he  appears  to  have  lost  all  confi- 
dence in  his  officers  and  men: —  to  have  suspected  treachery 
of  which  he  was  to  be  the  first  victim  .  .  .  experienced  a  men- 
tal paralysis  that  rendered  him  incapable  of  judgment  or 


energy 


69 


Two  months  before  this  report  from  Canby,  the  Judge  Ad- 
vocate General  had  delivered  another  opinion — this  time  to 
the  Secretary  of  War.  He  cited  testimony  from  Captain  Crilly 


69.    Canby   to   Adjt.   Gen.,   Lynde's   file    (L736-ACP-1866),    National   Archives.    It 
should  here  be  recalled  that  26  of  his  command  later  deserted  to  the  enemy.  ( See  note  47. ) 


32  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  Surgeon  Norris,  Purveyor  General  of  the  New  Mexico 
department.  Crilly  had  said  of  Lynde's  action  that  it  ".  .  . 
should  be  attributed  not  to  the  disloyalty  of  Major  Lynde  but 
to  his  incapacity  for  the  management  of  his  command  in  such 
an  emergency,  he  having  become  superannuated  in  service."70 
Norris  felt  that  the  ".  .  .  loss  of  the  command  was  caused 
by  [a  lack  of?]  foresight  and  precaution  .  .  .,"  and  that 
Lynde's  loyalty  was  not  questioned. 

From  this  and  Canby's  testimony,  the  Judge  Advocate 
General  arrived  at  these  conclusions : 

. . .  first . . .  the  abandonment . . .  warranted  by  a  fair  con- 
struction of  Col.  Canby's  orders,  in  a  certain  conjuncture  which 
Major  Lynde  was  justified  in  the  circumstances  in  believing  to 
have  arrived  .  .  .  perhaps  he  fell  into  an  error  of  judgment, 
cannot  be  properly  held  guilty  of  dereliction  of  duty : — second 
. . .  precautions  taken  . . .  for  defense  were  not  such  as  the  situ- 
ation called  for,  nor  such  as  a  reasonably  prudent,  vigelent 
[sic]  and  competent  officer  should  have  exercised. — third  .  .  . 
undue  precipitancy  of  the  movement  tended  to  demoralize  the 
troops: — fourth  .  .  .  his  mismanagement  of  the  retreat  .  .  . 
was  unsoldierly  and  culpable: — and  fifth  .  .  .  surrender  to  a 
probably  inferior  force,  without  firing  a  shot,  though  perhaps 
it  finally  became  inevitable,  was,  nevertheless  without  excuse, 
and  fully  deserving  of  the  rebuke  with  which  it  was  visited."71 

Eight  months  later,  in  September,  1866,  someone  per- 
suaded the  nation's  foremost  military  hero  to  look  into  the 
whole  matter.  The  name  of  that  someone  does  not  appear 
anywhere  in  the  official  files,  but  it  should  not  be  difficult  to 
guess.  It  is  still  a  matter  of  local  knowledge  in  Lynde's  home 
village  of  Williamstown  that  his  daughter,  "Lou,"  sometimes 
visited  there,  and  that  she  was  Mrs.  Frederick  Tracy  Dent. 
According  to  Cullum's  Register,  her  husband  and  Ulysses 
Grant  were  classmates  at  West  Point.  Somewhere  out  on  the 
frontier,  where  Dent  several  times  served  on  the  same  posts 
as  Lynde,  the  young  officer  met  and  married  the  older  officer's 
daughter.  Dent's  sister  married,  also.  Her  name  was  Julia, 

70.  See  note  50.  Crilly's  "superannuated  in  service"  is  very  close  to  "superannuated 
and  unfit  for  service"  of  Need's  letter  to  Cameron  from  Fort  Fauntleroy.  Although  I 
have  found  no  record  of  Crilly  visiting  Fort  Fauntleroy  after  the  surrender,  he  may  pos- 
sibly have  done  so  and  talked  with  Need  there. 

71.  J.  Holt,  Judge  Advocate  Gen'l  to  Sec'v  of  War.  Lynde's  file  (op.  ctt.). 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  33 

and  she  later  became  Mrs.  U.  S.  Grant.  Another  binding  cir- 
cumstance in  this  small  net  of  relationships  was  Dent's  double 
identity  as  Isaac  Lynde's  son-in-law  on  the  one  hand,  and 
Grant's  aide-de-camp  on  the  other.  The  Dictionary  of  Ameri- 
can Biography  says  of  him,  in  part:  ".  .  .  Dent  was  not  a 
brilliant  soldier,  and  owed  much  to  his  relationship  to  General 
Grant.  ..."  Probably  the  same  might  be  said  of  Major  Isaac 
Lynde. 

In  any  case,  Grant  found  that  Lynde  had  been  "summarily 
dismissed  .  .  .  without  trial  or  investigation  of  his  conduct." 
Grant  recommended  to  Stanton  that  Lynde  be  appointed 
Colonel  of  Infantry  and  retired  immediately  on  appropriate 
pay.72 

A  memorandum  from  the  Adjutant  General's  Office  re- 
plied that  Lynde  could  not,  under  the  system  then  in  force,  be 
raised  to  Colonel,  but  that  he  could  be  restored  to  his  Major's 
rank,  with  his  pay  retroactive.  In  obscure  support  of  this 
view,  it  was  pointed  out  that  Lynde  would  have  been  a  Colonel 
in  1864,  had  he  stayed  in  the  service,  but  that  he  had  passed 
the  age  of  sixty-two,  the  retirement  age,  only  a  month  before 
Grant's  recommendation.73 

The  wheels  of  the  Army  began  to  turn,  and  after  a  suitable 
number  of  revolutions  and  two  more  long  weeks  for  Lynde,  on 
November  27th  the  War  Department's  General  Order  No.  94 
came  out  of  the  huge  machine.  It  announced  that  by  Presi- 
dent Johnson's  direction  the  order  dismissing  Lynde  back  in 
1861  had  been  revoked.  His  Major's  rank  was  restored,  and  he 
was  retired  as  of  July  28, 1866.74 

*       *       *       * 

Major  Isaac  Lynde  lived  for  another  twenty  years.  His 
listing  in  Cullum  closes  with  the  curious  fact  that  he  served 
on  court-martial  duty  on  March  7,  1867 — but  this  could  have 
nothing  to  do  with  his  own  trouble,  since  by  that  time,  of 
course,  he  was  safely  reinstated.  Very  little  else  is  known 
about  him.  The  old  soldier  who  had  shown  so  much  promise  as 
a  boy  in  the  Vermont  hills,  who  must  have  felt  that  promise 

72.    Grant  to  Stanton,  September  18,  1866,  Lynde's  file,  op.  cit. 
78.    J.  C.  Kelton  memorandum,  Lynde's  file,  op.  cit. 
74.    Lynde's  file,  op.  cit. 


34  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

wearing  away  in  his  middle  years  on  the  western  plains  and 
the  southwestern  deserts,  went  neither  east  nor  west  nor 
southwest  in  his  remaining  days.  Instead,  he  returned  to 
scenes  reminiscent  of  his  first  duty,  as  a  young  lieutenant,  in 
the  Old  Northwest.  He  lived  for  a  time  in  St.  Paul,  Minne- 
sota.75 Later,  he  moved  to  Florida,  but  when  he  left  the  one 
for  the  other  is  not  clear. 

On  April  4, 1886,  a  telegram  from  St.  Augustine,  Florida, 
signed  by  an  N.  R.  Fitzhugh,  informed  Mrs.  T.  F.  Dent  of 
Washington,  D.  C.,  that  Major  Lynde  had  died  the  preceding 
night,  and  that  his  body  would  be  sent  to  Baltimore.76  A  few 
weeks  later,  Captain  F.  Marcy  Lynde,  retired,  reported  to  the 
Adjutant  General  the  cause  of  his  father's  death.77  He  termed 
it  a  "general  breaking  down  of  the  system  from  advanced 
age."  Army  records  show  that  the  Major  would  have  been  82 
in  that  year.  According  to  his  West  Point  file,  he  would  have 
been  80. 

It  is  curious  that  Lynde  died  at  Picolata,  twenty  miles 
from  St.  Augustine,  roughly  the  same  distance  as  from  Fort 
Fillmore  to  St.  Augustine  Springs,  New  Mexico,  over  the 
route  of  his  old  retreat.  In  a  way,  it  could  be  said  that  his 
body,  shipped  through  St.  Augustine  on  its  way  to  Baltimore, 
retraced  the  pattern  of  his  tragic  last  hours  with  his 
command. 

Just  three  months  before  Major  Lynde's  death,  James 
Cooper  McKee — the  doctor,  the  tactician,  the  champion  of 
righteousness — republished  his  petition  to  the  Army,78  chal- 
lenging the  legality  of  President  Johnson's  order  restoring 
Lynde,  and  demanding  that  the  old  Major's  name  be  once 
more  stricken  from  the  rolls. 


75.  There  he  dated  and  filled  out  a  form,  sent  to  him  by  the  Army  in  1872,  stating 
that  he  had  "never  served  in  any  Volunteer  Organization  in  any  capacity."  Op.  cit. 

76.  Ibid. 

77.  Ibid. 

78.  Narrative,  p.  27. 


MAJOR  ISAAC  LYNDE  35 

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NOT  CITED  IN  THE  NOTES 

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the  War),  37th  Congress,  3rd  Session.  Washington,  Government  Printing  Office, 

1863. 
U.S.  Army,  Official  Register  for  September,  1861.  U.S.  Adjutant  General's  Office, 

September  1,  1861. 
U.S.  Army,  Regulations  for  the  army  of  the  United  States:  N.Y.,  Harper  &  Bros., 

1857. 
U.S.  Adjutant  General's  Department,  Subject  Index  of  General  Orders:  Washington, 

Government  Printing  Office,  1882. 

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Bender,  A.  B.,  "Military  Posts  in  the  Southwest,"  NMHR,  VoL  XVI,  127-147. 

Crimmins,  Colonel  M.  L.,  "Fort  Fillmore,"  NMHR,  Vol.  VI,  pp.  327-333. 

Darrow,  Mrs.  Caroline  Baldwin,  "Recollections  of  the  Twiggs  Surrender,"  Battles 

and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War,  Vol.  I  (1887),  pp.  33-39. 
Davis,  W.  W.  H.,  El  Gringo,  or  New  Mexico  and  her  people :  N.Y.,  Harper  &  Bros., 

1857. 

Farish,  Thomas  Edwin,  History  of  Arizona:  Phoenix,  1915-18. 
Greeley,  Horace,  The  American  Conflict:  Hartford,  O.  D.  Case  &  Co.,  1866. 
Hayes,  Augustus  Allen,  Jr.,  New  Colorado  and  the  Santa  Fe  Trail:   London,   C. 

Kegan  Paul  &  Co.,  1881. 
Henderson,  H.  McCorry,  Texas  in  the  confederacy:  Naylor  Co.,  San  Antonio,  1955. 

P.  70. 
Manucy,   Albert,   Artillery  through   the  ages,   National   Park   Service  Interpretive 

Series,  History  No.  3 :  U.S.  Gov't  Printing  Office,  Washington,  1949.  Howitzers, 

p.  56  ff. 
Pendell,  Lucille  H.  and  Elizabeth  Bethel,  Preliminary  inventory  of  the  records  of  the 

Adjutant  General's  Office,   Preliminary  inventory  No.   17 :   Washington,   1949, 

National  Archives  Publication  No.  49-21. 

Pettis,  George  H.,  Brevet  Captain,  U.S.A.,  "The  Confederate  invasion  of  New  Mexi- 
co and  Arizona,"  Battles  and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War,  Vol.  II    (1887),  pp. 

103-111. 
Stanley,   F.    (Stanley  Francis  Louis   Crocchiola),  Fort   Union:   The  World   Press, 

1953. 
Teel,  Trevanion  T.,  Captain,  C.S.A.,  "Sibley's  New  Mexican  campaign — its  objects 

and  the  causes  of  its  failure,"  Battles  and  Leaders  of  the  Civil  War,  VoL  II 

(1887),  p.  700. 
Twitchell,  Ralph  Emerson,  "The  Confederate  invasion  of  New  Mexico,"  Old  Santa  Fe, 

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Twitchell,  Ralph  Emerson,  Leading  facts  in  New  Mexican  history,  Vol.  II.  Cedar 

Rapids,  1911. 
Waldrip,  William,  "New  Mexico  during  the  Civil  War,"  NMHR,  Vol.  XXVIII,  No.  3 

(July)  and  No.  4  (Oct.). 
Walker,  Charles  S.,  "Causes  of  the  Confederate  invasion  of  New  Mexico,"  NMHR, 

Vol.  VIII,  pp.  76-97. 
Walker,  Charles  S.,  "Confederate  government  in  Dona  Ana  County,"  NMHR,  VoL 

VI,  253-302. 
Watford,  W.  H.,  "Confederate  Western  Ambitions,"  Southwest  Historical  Review, 

Vol.  XLIV,  No.  2  (Oct.  1940). 


FORT  UNION  AND  THE  SANTA  FE  TRAIL 
By  ROBERT  M.  UTLEY  * 

FOR  over  half  a  century  a  wide  band  of  wagon  ruts  joined 
New  Mexico,  first  as  a  Mexican  province,  later  as  Ameri- 
can territory,  to  the  Missouri  frontier  and  the  States.  Be- 
tween the  American  conquest  in  1846  and  the  coming  of  the 
railroad  in  the  decade  of  the  seventies,  the  Santa  Fe  Trail 
was  a  momentous  avenue  of  commerce,  transportation,  and 
communication. 

In  Kansas  the  Trail  divided,  to  enter  New  Mexico  by  two 
routes.  The  Cimarron  Cutoff,  shortest  but  most  dangerous 
fork,  turned  southwest  from  the  Arkansas  River  and  followed 
the  dry  course  of  the  Cimarron  River  into  the  Oklahoma  pan- 
handle, reaching  New  Mexico  near  present  Clayton.  The 
Mountain  Branch,  100  miles  longer  and  with  the  treacherous 
barrier  of  Raton  Pass,  kept  to  the  north  bank  of  the  Arkansas, 
turned  southwest  along  the  base  of  the  Rockies,  and  dropped 
into  New  Mexico  at  Raton  Pass.  The  two  branches  united  at 
the  junction  of  Mora  River  and  Sapello  Creek,  near  modern 
Watrous.  Six  miles  north  of  this  strategic  road  junction  the 
United  States  Army  in  1851  built  Fort  Union,  destined  to 
play  a  direct,  active,  and  vital  role  in  the  subsequent  drama 
of  the  Santa  Fe  Trail. 

Indeed,  Fort  Union  owed  its  birth  to  the  Santa  Fe  Trail. 
It  was  not,  as  usually  assumed,  conceived  as  the  "guardian  of 
the  trail,"  although  this  turned  out  to  be  a  major  role.  Its 
principal  function  was  to  serve  as  a  depot  for  military  sup- 
plies shipped  over  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  to  the  United  States 
Army  in  New  Mexico.1  The  Mexican  War  had  revolutionized 
the  Santa  Fe  trade.  Before  1846  the  Trail  had  been  an  inter- 

*  National  Park  Service,  Region  Three,  Santa  Fe,  New  Mexico. 

1.  There  were,  of  course,  other  reasons.  Colonel  Sumner  had  been  advised  by  Secre- 
tary of  War  Conrad  to  move  the  troops  out  of  the  New  Mexican  towns  and  advance 
them  closer  to  the  Indian  country.  Fort  Union  was  thus  an  outpost  against  the  Utes 
and  Jicarilla  Apaches.  At  the  same  time,  Maj.  Thomas  Swords,  examining  the  New 
Mexican  defense  system  for  the  Secretary,  reported  that  the  towns,  besides  being  expen- 
sive and  inconvenient  sites  for  military  posts,  had  a  corrupting  influence  on  the  soldiers. 
Conrad  to  Sumner,  April  1,  1851,  in  Annie  H.  Abel  (ed.),  The  Official  Correspondence 
of  James  S.  CaUioun  (Washington,  1915),  383-84;  A.  V.  Bender,  "Frontier  Defense  in 
the  Territory  of  New  Mexico,  1846-1858,"  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW,  IX,  3  (July, 
1934),  264-65. 


FORT  UNION  37 

national  highway  linking  two  alien  communities.  But  "Kear- 
ny's  baggage  train,"  as  Paxson  wrote,  "started  a  new  era  in 
plains  freighting.  ...  It  became  a  matter  of  business,  run- 
ning smoothly  along  familiar  channels."2  Gregg's  "commerce 
of  the  prairies,"  conducted  largely  by  private  speculators,  all 
but  disappeared,  and  freighters  specializing  in  hauling  some- 
one else's  goods  took  over  the  Santa  Fe  Trail.  A  major  por- 
tion of  these  goods  was  destined  for  the  frontier  posts  in 
the  Territory  of  New  Mexico. 

The  Southwest  proved  an  expensive  acquisition  to  the 
United  States,  for  the  population  had  been  promised  protec- 
tion from  marauding  Indians.  In  1849  almost  1,000  soldiers, 
one-seventh  of  the  United  States  Army,  served  in  New  Mex- 
ico's Ninth  Military  Department.  By  1859  the  number  had 
risen  to  2,000,  distributed  among  16  scattered  frontier  out- 
posts. The  land  was  not  rich  enough  to  subsist  this  army,  and 
almost  all  provisions  had  to  be  hauled  over  the  Santa  Fe  Trail 
from  Fort  Leavenworth. 

The  need  for  a  depot  on  the  eastern  frontier  of  New  Mex- 
ico to  receive  and  distribute  these  goods  to  other  posts  early 
became  apparent.  In  the  spring  of  1851  the  Department  Com- 
mander, Maj.  and  Bvt.  Col.  John  Munroe,  sent  his  Quarter- 
master, Capt.  L.  C.  Easton,  and  Lt.  John  G.  Parke  of  the 
Topographical  Engineers  to  "examine  the  country  in  the  vi- 
cinity of  Las  Vegas  and  on  the  Moro  [sic]  Creek  with  a  view 
of  selecting  a  site  for  the  establishment  of  a  depot  for  sup- 
plies coming  from  the  U.  S."3  By  late  April  the  reconnaissance 
had  been  completed  and  a  report  turned  in  (it  has  not  been 
found)  ,4  but  Munroe  was  almost  immediately  replaced  by  Lt. 
Col.  and  Bvt.  Col.  Edwin  V.  Sumner.  Nevertheless,  in  July 
1851  Sumner  established  a  supply  depot  such  as  envisioned 
by  his  predecessor  and  located  it  in  the  area  reconnoitered  by 
Parke  and  Easton.  He  also  moved  Department  Headquarters 

2.  Frederick  L.  Paxson,  The  Last  American  Frontier  (New  York,  1910),  67. 

3.  Lt.  and  Acting  Assistant  Adjutant  General  (hereafter  AAAG)  Lafayette  McLaws 
to  Lt.  John  G.  Parke,  March  12,  1851;  Special  Order  (hereafter  SO)   No.  14,  Hq.  Ninth 
Mil.  Dept.,  Santa  Fe,  March  14,  1851 ;  National  Archives,  typescript  in  Arrott  Collection, 
Highlands  Univ.,  Las  Vegas,  N.  M.  Hereafter  all  citations  of  material  from  the  Na- 
tional Archives  in  the  Arrott  Collection  will  be  designated  NA,  AC. 

4.  Munroe  to  Adjt.  Gen.    (hereafter  AG)    Roger  Jones,   April  30,   1851,   NA,  AC, 
transmitted  the  report  to  Washington. 


38  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

from  Santa  Fe  to  the  new  depot,  which  was  named  Fort 
Union.5 

Military  freight  hauled  from  Fort  Leavenworth  was  un- 
loaded at  the  Fort  Union  depot,  repacked,  and  assigned  as 
needed  to  the  posts  of  New  Mexico  and  Arizona.  Often,  when 
wagons  or  entire  trains  contained  shipments  for  one  fort  only, 
they  continued  directly  to  the  destination  without  unloading 
at  Fort  Union.  Other  Quartermaster  depots  were  established, 
at  Yuma  and  San  Antonio,  but  Fort  Union  continued  through- 
out its  lifetime  to  be  the  supply  center  of  the  frontier  army 
in  the  Southwest. 

Virtually  all  military  freighting  on  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  was 
performed  under  contract  by  civilian  companies.  Waste  and 
inefficiency  had  characterized  the  logistical  support,  managed 
by  the  Quartermaster  Department,  of  Kearny's  Army  of  the 
West,  and  in  1848  the  Government  turned  to  the  contract  sys- 
tem. For  $11.75  per  hundred,  James  Browne  of  Independence 
in  that  year  agreed  to  transport  200,000  pounds  of  supplies 
to  New  Mexico.  The  next  year,  in  partnership  with  William 
H.  Russell,  he  contracted  to  haul  all  government  stores  over 
the  Santa  Fe  Trail  for  $9.88  per  hundred.  Joseph  Clymer  and 
David  Waldo  entered  the  field  in  1850,  and  that  year  278 
wagons  of  military  freight  passed  over  the  Trail  to  New  Mex- 
ico. Some  continued  to  the  new  post  at  El  Paso.  Browne,  Rus- 
sell, and  Company  were  the  largest  contractors,  accounting 
for  135  of  the  278  wagons.6 

In  1853  another  new  freighter  made  his  appearance,  his 
name  destined  to  be  linked  to  that  of  William  H.  Russell.  Alex- 
ander Majors  made  two  round  trips  to  New  Mexico,  one  with 
a  consignment  of  goods  from  Independence  to  Santa  Fe,  the 
other  under  government  contract  from  Fort  Leavenworth  to 
Fort  Union.  In  1854,  again  under  contract,  he  sent  100 
wagons  in  four  trains  from  Leavenworth  to  Union.  The  fol- 
lowing year  he  went  into  partnership  with  William  H.  Rus- 


5.  Sumner  to  Jones,  Oct.  24,  1851,  in  Abel  (ed.),  Official  Correspondence  of  James 
S.  Calhoun,  416-18.  Throughout  the  1850's  and  1860's  Department  Headquarters  was  lo- 
cated variously  at  Fort  Union,  Santa  Fe,  Albuquerque,  and  elsewhere  depending  on  the 
scene  of  most  active  operations. 

6.  Walker  D.  Wyman,   "The  Military   Phase  of  Santa  Fe  Freighting,   1846-1865," 
Kansas  Historical  Quarterly,  I,  5  (November,  1932),  415-28. 


FORT  UNION  39 

sell.  In  1856  Majors  and  Russell  had  350  wagons  on  the  Trail, 
and  the  next  year  contracted  to  deliver  five  million  pounds  of 
freight.  In  1858,  a  third  partner  having  joined  the  firm,  Rus- 
sell, Majors,  and  Waddell  contracted  to  deliver  all  freight 
turned  over  to  them  by  the  Government,  and  by  1860  and 
1861  were  the  principal  contractors  freighting  between  Fort 
Leavenworth  and  Fort  Union.7 

Large-scale  military  freighting,  dominated  by  Russell, 
Majors,  and  Waddell,  continued  until  1866,  when  the  rail- 
road moved  west  into  Kansas.  Each  railroad  town  thereafter 
served  briefly  as  the  port  of  embarkation  for  freight  wagons. 
After  the  rails  reached  Denver  in  1870,  wagons  continued  to 
move  supplies  over  the  Mountain  Branch  of  the  Trail  between 
Pueblo  and  Fort  Union.  The  Santa  Fe  Railroad  crossed  the 
Mora  Valley  in  1879  and  ended  the  era  of  military  freighting 
on  the  Santa  Fe  Trail. 

Fort  Union  consisted  not  only  of  a  Quartermaster  depot 
to  handle  incoming  supplies,  but  also  of  a  military  post.  The 
post  garrison  performed  duties  similar  to  those  of  other  gar- 
risons in  the  West.  One  important  function  of  the  frontier 
army  was  to  blaze  new  wagon  roads  and  improve  old  ones. 
Officers  and  men  of  Fort  Union  expended  such  labor  princi- 
pally on  the  Santa  Fe  Trail. 

Shortly  after  Colonel  Sumner  established  Fort  Union,  his 
Quartermaster,  Capt.  E.  S.  Sibley,  laid  out  a  road  that  linked 
Fort  Union  with  the  main  route  of  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  between 
the  Mora  Crossings  and  Las  Vegas.  Although  it  saved  several 
miles,  this  route  seems  to  have  enjoyed  only  briefly  the  favor 
of  freighters  and  other  travellers.8 

At  the  same  time,  Sumner  sent  Lt.  John  Pope  of  the  Topo- 
graphical Engineers  to  seek  "a  new  road  by  the  shortest 
practicable  route  between  this  point  and  Fort  Leavenworth." 
Lying  between  the  Cimarron  Cutoff  and  the  Mountain 
Branch,  Pope's  road  intersected  the  Arkansas  River  at  Big 


7.  Ibid.;  Alexander  Majors,  Seventy  Years  on  the  Frontier  (Denver,  1893),  140-43; 
Edward  Steere,  Fort  Union:  Its  Economic  and  Military  History   (Ms.  Report,  National 
Park  Service,  Santa  Fe,  c.  1939),  55-57. 

8.  Report  of  Col.  J.  K.  F.  Mansfield  .  .  .  Regarding  his  Inspection  of  the  Depart- 
ment of  New  Mexico  During  .  .  .  1853   (Ms.,  National  Archives,  typescript  in  Library, 
Museum  of  New  Mexico,  Santa  Fe) . 


40  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Timbers,  near  the  site  of  Bent's  Fort,  in  modern  Colorado.9 
An  extension  of  this  road,  probably  also  pioneered  by  Pope, 
connected  Fort  Union  with  the  Cimarron  Branch  at  the  cross- 
ing of  the  Canadian  River  by  a  route  lying  north  of  the  Tur- 
key Mountains,  thus  gaining  several  miles  to  travellers 
arriving  on  the  Cimarron  Branch.10 

Pope's  road  was  a  compromise  between  the  Mountain  and 
Cimarron  Branches.  It  was  shorter  than  the  Mountain 
Branch  and,  by  skirting  the  eastern  slope  of  the  Raton  Moun- 
tains, avoided  the  winter  snows  of  Raton  Pass.  During  the 
Civil  War  it  had  another  advantage :  it  was  far  enough  from 
Texas  to  be  free  of  the  Confederate  threat  to  the  Cimarron 
Branch,  a  threat  that  existed  less  in  reality  than  in  the  minds 
of  Union  officers. 

The  advantages  of  this  road,  with  a  slight  variation  at  its 
northern  end  to  connect  with  Fort  Wise  (later  Fort  Lyon), 
were  not  lost  upon  officers  at  Fort  Union  and  Santa  Fe.  Sup- 
ply trains  for  Union  forces  in  New  Mexico  might  use  this 
road  the  year  around  without  fear  of  Texan  guerrillas.  From 
Fort  Union  to  the  head  of  the  Cimarron  the  road  had  already 
been  surveyed,  and  required  only  minor  banking  and  grading 
at  stream  crossings.  From  Fort  Wise  south  but  little  work  was 
needed,  principally  on  the  eastern  slopes  of  the  Raton  Moun- 
tains. During  the  winter  of  1861  and  summer  of  1862,  there- 
fore, details  from  Forts  Union  and  Wise  worked  towards  each 
other  on  this  road,  meeting  on  the  upper  Cimarron.11  What 
share  of  Civil  War  freight  the  road  carried  thereafter  is  not 
apparent.  It  is  clear,  however,  that  the  Mountain  and  Cim- 
arron Branches  also  continued  to  be  used  by  freighters. 

In  addition  to  processing  military  freight  and  seeking  new 
and  better  routes,  troops  from  Fort  Union  performed  another 


9.  SO  No.  68,  Fort  Union,  Aug.  6,  1851,  NA,  AC ;  Sumner  to  AG  Roger  Jones,  Oct. 
24,  1851,  in  Abel  (ed.),  Official  Correspondence  of  James  S.  Calhoun,  416-18. 

10.  Mansfield  Report  (1853).  Colonel  Mansfield  gives  credit  for  this  to  Capt.  James 
H.  Carleton,  whom  he  probably  confused  with  Lieutenant  Pope.  Carleton  and  his  com- 
pany were  patrolling  the  Cimarron  Route  at  the  same  time  Pope  was  reconnoitering 
the  new  road.  The  mistake,  therefore,  is  understandable. 

11.  Capt.  &  AQM  J.  C.  McFerran  to  Maj.  &  QM  J.  L.  Donaldson,  Nov.  11,  1861 ; 
Lt.  &  AAAG  W.  J.  L.  Nicodemus  to  Capt.  Elmer  Otis,  4th  Cav.,  Nov.  15,  1861 ;  Nico- 
demus  to  Commanding  Officer  (hereafter  CO)   Fort  Union,  Nov.  15,  1861;  SO  No.  125, 
Hq.,  Dept.  of  N.  M.,  July  16,  1862 ;  SO  No.  144,  Hq.,  Dept.  of  N.  M.,  Aug.  15,  1862, 
NA,  AC. 


FORT  UNION  41 

important  duty  connected  with  the  Santa  Fe  Trail.  Military 
protection  of  the  Trail  is  a  chapter  in  its  history  that  re- 
mains to  be  adequately  explored.  Historians  have  dealt  with 
early  attempts  to  provide  escorts  from  Missouri  to  the  Ar- 
kansas, but  the  part  played  by  the  garrison  of  Fort  Union 
has  never  been  fully  told.  Although  less  dramatic,  it  spanned 
15  years  and  proved  far  more  effective. 

No  sooner  had  Fort  Union  been  established  than  Colonel 
Sumner,  in  August  1851,  issued  orders  for  Capt.  James  H. 
Carleton  to  patrol  the  Cimarron  Branch  of  the  Trail  between 
Fort  Union  and  the  Arkansas.  With  his  Company  K,  First 
Dragoons,  Carleton  remained  in  the  field  until  November  4. 
So  successful  was  he  in  preventing  depredations  on  freight 
trains  by  the  Kiowas,  Comanches,  and  Jicarilla  Apaches  that 
he  drew  the  same  assignment  the  next  year.  During  the  sum- 
mer of  1852  Company  K  twice  marched  to  Fort  Atkinson,  at 
the  crossing  of  the  Arkansas,  and  returned  to  Fort  Union.12 

After  1852  there  is  no  record  of  further  patrolling  such  as 
Carleton  had  performed  for  the  remainder  of  the  decade. 
Rather,  protection  took  the  form  of  military  escorts  of  the 
Independence-Santa  Fe  Mail.13  During  the  1850's  the  Kiowas 
and  Comanches  were  in  general  friendly,  or  at  least  not  ac- 
tively hostile,  and  the  war  against  the  Jicarillas  kept  the  tribe 
busy  in  the  mountains  around  Taos  and  Abiquiu.  Neverthe- 
less, escorts  were  furnished  whenever  officials  of  the  stage 
company  or  Post  Office  Department  feared  that  danger  ex- 
isted. Late  in  1857,  as  the  result  of  a  directive  from  the  Secre- 
tary of  War,  the  Commanding  Officer  at  Fort  Union  began 
providing  regular  escorts  for  the  mail. 

The  escort  usually  consisted  of  an  officer  and  20  to  40  men, 
later  of  a  sergeant  and  15  to  20  men,  who  accompanied  the 


12.  Sumner  to  Carleton,   Aug.   1,   1851 ;   SO   No.   23,   Hq.,   Ninth   Mil.   Dept.,   near 
Albuquerque,  March  28,   1852  ;   SO   No.   31,   Hq.,   Ninth   Mil.   Dept.,   near  Albuquerque, 
May  3,  1852  ;  Annual  Returns,  First  Dragoons,  1851  and  1852,  NA,  AC.  Sumner  to  AG 
Roger  Jones,  Oct.  24,  1851,  in  Abel  (ed.).  Official  Correspondence  of  James  S.  Calhoun, 
416-18. 

13.  Monthly  stage  service  was  inaugurated  between  Independence  and  Santa  Fe  in 
July  1850,  with  a  contract  let  to  carry  the  U.  S.  Mail.  Throughout  the  1850's  service  was 
erratic,  and  as  late  as  1860  the  commander  of  the  Department  of  New  Mexico  complained 
of  the  "great  irregularity  of  the  Mails."  Col.  T.  T.  Fauntleroy  to  Postmaster  General, 
Dec.  16,  1860,  NA,  AC ;  LeRoy  R.  Hafen,  The  Overland  Mail,  1849-1869  (Glendale,  1926), 
70-73,  briefly  sketches  the  details  of  the  Santa  Fe  Mail. 


42  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

stages  to  the  Arkansas  and  returned  to  Fort  Union  with  the 
next  west-bound  mail.  The  soldiers,  infantry  or  dismounted 
horsemen,  rode  in  wagons.  This  method  had  been  adopted 
by  Col.  John  Garland,  Department  Commander,  because  it 
afforded  better  defense  in  the  event  of  attack  and  because  of 
the  scarcity  of  grass,  especially  in  winter,  along  the  road 
between  the  Canadian  and  the  Arkansas.  Even  so,  the  mules 
drawing  the  escort  wagons  frequently  broke  down  and  al- 
ways had  trouble  keeping  up  with  the  mail  coaches.  The  stage 
company  had  relay  stations  with  fresh  animals  on  the  Mora 
and  the  Arkansas,  but  the  army  mules  travelled  over  600 
miles,  from  Fort  Union  to  the  Arkansas  and  back,  without 
relief.  So  troublesome  did  this  problem  become  that  Colonel 
Garland  in  March  1858  requested  the  Adjutant  General  of 
the  Army  to  have  instructions  issued  to  the  mail  company  to 
keep  pace  with  the  slower  moving  escort.14 

The  necessity  of  furnishing  escorts  kept  the  Fort  Union 
garrison  constantly  below  strength,  and  proved  a  serious 
handicap  to  the  post  commander.  Nevertheless,  Colonel  Gar- 
land could  report  early  in  1858  "that  no  mail  has  been  lost 
since  my  administration  of  this  Military  Department — four 
years  and  a  half — and  that  I  have  never  failed  to  furnish 
escorts  whenever  in  my  judgment  they  were  deemed 
necessary."18 

Probably  as  a  result  of  these  difficulties,  and  the  apparent 
friendliness  of  the  Indians  on  the  Cimarron  Route,  Garland 
in  May  1858  discontinued  the  escorts.  In  October  1859,  how- 
ever, the  mail  from  Independence  failed  to  arrive  in  Santa  Fe 
on  schedule.  Citizens  and  postal  officials  became  so  alarmed 
that  Col.  B.  L.  E.  Bonneville,  Garland's  successor,  was  in- 
duced to  order  two  officers  and  75  men,  virtually  the  entire 
garrison  of  Fort  Union,  to  escort  the  next  eastbound  stage 
to  the  Arkansas.  At  Cottonwood  Spring  the  mail  and  escort, 
under  Capt.  R.  M.  Morris  of  the  Regiment  of  Mounted  Rifles, 


14.  Lt.   &  AAAG  W.   A.   Nichols  to  Lt.  Col.   Philip   St.   George  Cooke,   March   12. 
1854;  Unsgd.   (Fort  Union)   to  Nichols,  March  8,  1856;  Nichols  to  CoL  W.  W.  Loring. 
Jan.  29,  1857 ;  Col.  B.  L.  E.  Bonneville  to  AAG  Lorenzo  Thomas,  Feb.  28,  1857 ;  Loring 
to  Nichols,  Jan.  25,  1858  ;  Garland  to  AG  Samuel  Cooper,  Jan.  30  &  March  14,  1858 ; 
Loring  to  Capt.  &  AQM  L.  C.  Easton,  March  9,  1858,  NA,  AC. 

15.  Garland  to  AG  Samuel  Cooper,  Jan.  30,  1858,  NA,  AC. 


FORT  UNION  43 

met  the  west-bound  mail.  It  was  accompanied  by  Col.  Thomas 
T.  Fauntleroy  and  escort  enroute  to  Santa  Fe  to  replace  Col- 
onel Bonneville.  Fauntleroy  issued  orders  on  the  spot  assum- 
ing command  of  the  Department  of  New  Mexico  (name  for 
the  Ninth  Military  Department  since  1853)  and  relieving 
Captain  Morris  and  half  of  his  command  of  further  escort 
duty.  At  the  same  time  he  called  upon  the  Adjutant  General 
for  "particular  instruction  at  the  earliest  moment"  on  the 
subject  of  furnishing  regular  escorts  for  the  mail.15* 

No  sooner  had  Fauntleroy  reached  Santa  Fe,  however, 
than  he  authorized  continued  escorts.  It  was  a  fortunate 
move,  for  on  December  4,  at  Cold  Spring  in  the  Oklahoma 
panhandle,  20  Kiowa  warriors  attacked  the  mail  wagon  and 
its  escort,  slightly  wounding  one  soldier.  The  Indians  were 
repulsed,  but  kept  the  troops  pinned  down  with  long-range 
rifle  fire  for  several  hours.16 

Thereafter  raiding  Kiowas  and  Comanches  became  in- 
creasingly active,  and  throughout  the  Civil  War  years  travel 
on  the  Cimarron  Branch  was  a  dangerous  undertaking. 
Fauntleroy  reinforced  Fort  Union,  and  escorts  regularly  ac- 
companied the  mail.  A  new  system  was  devised.  Troops  from 
Fort  Union  escorted  the  east-bound  mail  about  half  way  to  the 
Arkansas.  There  they  met  the  west-bound  mail  under  escort 
by  troops  from  Kansas.  Each  detachment  then  accompanied 
the  mail  back  to  its  home  base.17 

Later  in  1860  Fauntleroy  authorized  the  Commanding 
Officer  at  Fort  Union,  Lt.  Col.  George  B.  Crittenden,  to  seize 
any  opportunity  offered  to  strike  a  blow  at  the  Kiowas  and 
Comanches.  In  December  Crittenden  learned  that  a  war  party 
was  harassing  traffic  on  the  Mountain  Branch  about  70  miles 
north  of  Fort  Union.  With  88  men  of  Companies  D,  H,  K,  and 


15a.  Lt.  &  AAAG  J.  D.  Wilkins  to  Capt.  R.  M.  Morris,  Oct.  15,  17,  and  18,  1859 ; 
Wilkins  to  D.  V.  Whiting,  Postmaster  at  Santa  Fe,  Oct.  16  and  17,  1859 ;  Wilkins  to 
Lt.  A.  Jackson,  Oct.  17,  1859 ;  Bonneville  to  AAG  Lorenzo  Thomas,  Oct.  17,  1859 ; 
Bonneville  to  Gov.  Abraham  Rencher,  Oct.  18,  1859 ;  Fauntleroy  to  AG  Samuel  Cooper, 
Oct.  25,  1859 ;  Fauntleroy  to  Morris,  Oct.  25,  1859 ;  Fauntleroy  to  Thomas,  Nov.  6,  1859, 
NA,  AC. 

16.  Lt.  &  AAAG  J.  D.  Wilkins  to  Maj.  J.  S.  Simonson,  Nov.  14,  1859 ;  SO  No.  70, 
Fort  Union,   Nov.   16,   1859;   Simonson  to  Wilkins,   Dec.  9,   1859;   Fauntleroy   to  AAG 
Lorenzo  Thomas,  Dec.  12,  1859,  NA,  AC. 

17.  Wilkins  to  Lt.  D.  Bell,  Pawnee  Fork,  K.  T.,  Jan.  3,  1860 ;  Wilkins  to  Simonson, 
Jan.  10,  1860;  ibid..  Jan.  (?),  1860;  Jan.  28,  1860,  NA,  AC. 


44  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

E,  Regiment  of  Mounted  Rifles,  he  marched  up  the  Trail.  The 
Indians,  however,  had  moved  east  and  were  preparing  to 
attack  traffic  on  the  Cimarron  Branch.  The  Mounted  Riflemen 
followed  their  trail  night  and  day  and,  on  January  2,  1861, 
surprised  a  villiage  of  175  Kiowa  and  Comanche  lodges  on  the 
Cimarron  River  10  miles  north  of  Cold  Spring.  The  Indians 
were  driven  from  their  camp  with  a  loss  of  10  killed  and  an 
unknown  number  wounded.  Crittenden  had  three  men 
wounded.  The  troops  destroyed  the  village  and  its  contents 
and  returned  to  Fort  Union  with  40  captured  horses.18 

It  is  noteworthy  that,  throughout  the  decade  of  the  1850's, 
there  is  no  record  of  military  detachments  assigned  to  escort 
freight  caravans.  Except  for  Carleton's  operations  in  1851 
and  1852,  which  were  designed  to  safeguard  all  traffic  simply 
by  the  presence  of  troops  on  the  Trail,  all  escorts  were  of  the 
Independence-Santa  Fe  Mail.  To  the  extent  that  these  escorts 
advertised  to  the  Indians  the  proximity  of  soldiers,  they  in- 
directly protected  freight  trains.  The  freighters,  however, 
understood  the  conditions  of  the  trail  and  organized  for  their 
own  protection.  They  consequently  felt  no  need  of  military 
protection  and  made  no  demand  for  such  service.19  The  pic- 
ture changes  in  the  1860's.  The  mounting  Indian  menace,  the 
fear  of  Confederate  attacks  on  freight  caravans,  and  the  vital 
need  of  assuring  a  continuous  flow  of  provisions  to  Union 
forces  in  New  Mexico  led  to  escorts  of  freight  trains  on  the 
Santa  Fe  Trail. 

In  June  1861  Col.  Edward  R.  S.  Canby,  who  had  just 
assumed  command  in  New  Mexico,  promptly  took  two  steps 
to  protect  the  Santa  Fe  Trail.  Fearful  of  a  Confederate  move 
against  his  lines  of  supply  and  communication,  he  instructed 
Maj.  William  Chapman  at  Fort  Union  to  organize  parties  of 
Mexican  or  Indian  spies  to  watch  the  Cimarron  Branch  and 
the  road  from  Fort  Smith  via  the  Canadian  River  to  Anton 
Chico  and  Santa  Fe.  Masquerading  as  hunters  or  traders, 
they  were  to  operate  well  south  of  the  roads  and  give  timely 


18.  SO   No.   103,   Fort  Union,   Dec.   26,    1860;   Crittenden   to  AAAG  at   Santa   Fe, 
Jan.  11,  1861 ;  Fauntleroy  to  AAG  Lorenzo  Thomas,  Jan.  12,  1861,  NA,  AC. 

19.  Cf.  Steere,  Economic  and  Military  History,  34-35. 


FORT  UNION  45 

warning  of  Confederate  movements.  By  June  25  Chapman 
had  employed  nine  New  Mexicans  for  this  duty.20 

At  the  same  time  Canby  ordered  Capt.  Thomas  Duncan  at 
Fort  Union  to  lead  100  Mounted  Riflemen  and  two  companies 
of  recently  organized  New  Mexico  Volunteers  to  the  crossing 
of  the  Arkansas  to  escort  freight  trains  to  Fort  Union.  In 
August  he  sent  a  squadron  of  Mounted  Rifles  to  Fort  Wise, 
on  the  Arkansas  near  the  site  of  Bent's  Fort,  to  strengthen 
that  post  and  help  protect  trains  using  the  Mountain  Branch. 
In  the  same  month  Lt.  Col.  Christopher  "Kit"  Carson  marched 
four  companies  of  New  Mexico  Volunteers  to  the  Arkansas 
to  bring  in  trains  using  the  Cimarron  Route.21 

Patrols  and  escorts  carried  out  similar  missions  through- 
out the  winter  of  1861  and  summer  of  1862.  In  August  1862 
a  system  of  patrols  was  inaugurated  on  the  Mountain  Branch, 
troops  from  Fort  Union  covering  the  Trail  to  Raton  Pass, 
troops  from  Fort  Lyon  (formerly  Wise)  from  the  pass  to  that 
fort.  A  force  of  the  First  Colorado  Volunteers  was  ordered  to 
establish  a  temporary  camp  on  the  Mountain  Route  midway 
between  Forts  Wise  and  Union  and  give  protection  to  freight 
trains  and  mail  coaches.22 

That  troops  were  assigned  to  such  duty  during  1861  and 
1862  reflects  the  importance  Canby  attached  to  keeping  open 
the  Santa  Fe  Trail.  These  were  the  critical  Civil  War  years  in 
New  Mexico.  Texans  under  Lt.  Col.  John  R.  Baylor  occupied 
southern  New  Mexico  in  the  summer  of  1861,  and  the  Con- 
federate brigade  of  Brig.  Gen.  Henry  H.  Sibley  carried  the 
invasion  north  to  Albuquerque  and  Santa  Fe  during  the  first 
four  months  of  1862.  Battles  were  fought  at  Valverde  in  Feb- 
ruary and  Glorieta  Pass  in  March  before  the  Texans  with- 
drew from  the  Territory.  At  the  same  time  Navahos  and 

20.  Lt.  &  AAAG  A.  L.  Anderson  to  Chapman,  June  19,  1861,  NA,  AC.  Notation  on 
back  lists  names  of  New  Mexican  spies  employed  by  Chapman. 

21.  Anderson  to  CO  Fort  Union,  June  30,  1861,  War  of  the  Rebellion:  Official  Rec- 
ords of  the  Union  and  Confederate  Armies,  Ser.  I,  Vol.  IV,  49 ;  Canby  to  Chapman, 
Aug.  15,  1861 ;  Chapman  to  Col.  Ceran  St.  Vrain,  First  New  Mexico  Volunteers,  Aug.  18, 
1861 ;  Chapman  to  Anderson,  Aug.  22,  1861,  NA,  AC. 

22.  Lt.  &  AAAG  W.  J.  L.  Nicodemus  to  CO  Fort  Union,  Dec.  8,  1861 ;  Canby  to 
Col.  J.  M.  Chivington,  June  30,  1862  ;  Chapman  to  CO  Fort  Union,  July  2,  1862 ;  Canby 
to  AAAG  Dept.  of  Kansas,  July  3,  1862 ;  Capt.  &  AAAG  Gurden  Chapin  to  Col.  J.  H. 
Leavenworth,  Aug.  7,  1862 ;  Chapin  to  CO  Fort  Union,  Aug.  9,  1862,  NA,  AC. 


46  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Mescalero  Apaches  were  raiding  settlements  throughout  New 
Mexico.  Still,  these  demands  did  not  prevent  Canby  from 
detaching  troops  to  guard  the  Santa  Fe  Trail. 

When  Canby  went  east  to  other  duty  in  September  1862, 
Brig.  Gen.  James  H.  Carleton,  who  had  led  the  California 
Column  to  New  Mexico,  took  command  of  the  department  and 
retained  it  until  the  end  of  the  war.  He  appreciated  the  im- 
portance of  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  and,  from  his  experience  in 
patrolling  it  in  1851  and  1852,  was  familiar  with  the  problems 
involved  in  its  protection.  He  believed  that  troops  should  be 
temporarily  stationed  on  the  most  dangerous  section  of  the 
Trail,  and  recommended  to  the  Adjutant  General  in  May  and 
again  in  July  1863  that  four  companies  be  placed  at  Cold 
Spring  and  four  at  Cimarron  Spring.23 

This  plan  called  for  reinforcements  and  seems  not  to  have 
been  adopted  until  1864,  by  which  time  the  plains  were  in 
the  throes  of  a  disastrous  Indian  uprising,  with  Kiowas,  Co- 
manches,  and  Cheyennes  attacking  trains  between  the  Ar- 
kansas and  Fort  Union.  In  the  summer  of  1864  Carleton 
stationed  50  cavalrymen  and  50  infantrymen  at  the  crossing 
of  the  Arkansas,  an  equal  force  at  Lower  Cimarron  Springs, 
and  50  cavalrymen  and  30  infantrymen  at  Upper  Cimarron 
Springs.  He  also  sent  one  company  to  Fort  Lyon  and  one  to 
Gray's  Ranch,  on  the  Purgatory  River  in  Colorado,  to  police 
the  Mountain  Route.  These  troops,  California  and  New  Mex- 
ico Volunteers,  carried  rations  for  60  days.24 

Carleton  next  decided  to  strike  at  the  home  country  of  the 
Indians  who  were  raiding  on  the  Santa  Fe  Trail.  Late  in  No- 
vember 1864  he  sent  Col.  Kit  Carson  and  the  First  New  Mex- 
ico Cavalry,  fresh  from  victory  over  the  Navahos,  into  the 
Texas  panhandle,  heart  of  the  Kiowa-Comanche  country.  On 
November  26  the  troops  attacked  a  large  camp  of  Kiowas 
on  the  Canadian  River  near  the  ruins  of  William  Bent's  old 
trading  post.  Joined  by  Comanches,  the  Kiowas  counterat- 

23.  Carleton  to  AG  Lorenzo  Thomas,  May  10,  1863,  July  14,  1863,  in  U.  S.  Cong., 
Condition  of  the  Indian  Tribes:  Report  of  the  Joint  Special  Committee  Appointed  Under 
Resolution  of  March  S,  1865  (Washington,  1867),  109-10. 

24.  Carleton  to  Capt.  E.  H.  Bergmann,  Aug.  22,  1864 ;  Carleton  to  Thomas,  Aug.  27 
and  29,  1864 ;  SO  No.  32,  Dept.  of  N.  M.,  Aug.  20,  1864 ;  SO  No.  34,  Aug.  28,  1864,  in 
ibid.,  191-95,  241-42. 


FORT  UNION  47 

tacked  and  besieged  Carson  in  the  ruins.  The  battle  of  Adobe 
Walls  raged  all  day,  but  mountain  howitzers  kept  the  Indians 
at  bay.  At  dusk  the  troops  burned  the  Kiowa  village  and 
withdrew.25 

Meanwhile,  General  Carleton  made  preparations  for 
guarding  the  Trail  during  the  approaching  travel  season.  He 
had  hoped  to  establish  temporary  camps  during  the  sum- 
mer of  1865  at  Lower  Cimarron  Springs,  Cold  Spring,  Rabbit 
Ear  Creek  and  Whetstone  Creek,26  but,  probably  because  of 
insufficient  men,  modified  this  plan.  Instead,  on  February  8, 
1865,  he  published  the  following  notice:27 

To  the  people : : 

Owing  to  Indian  difficulties  upon  the  roads  leading  from 
New  Mexico  to  the  States,  a  company  of  troops  will  leave  Fort 
Union,  New  Mexico,  for  Fort  Lamed,  Kansas,  on  the  first  and 
fifteenth  of  every  month,  until  further  orders,  commencing  on 
the  first  day  of  March,  1865.  The  first  company  will  go  by  the 
Raton  mountain  route,  the  second  by  the  Cimarron  route,  and 
so  on,  alternately.  The  merchants  and  others  who  wish  to  send 
trains  in  after  goods  can  assemble  their  trains  at  such  points 
near  Fort  Union  as  may  be  desired  by  them,  so  as  to  have  the 
protection  of  these  periodical  escorts,  if  such  be  their  wish.  Ar- 
rangements will  be  made  with  Major  General  Curtis,  command- 
ing the  department  of  Kansas,  so  as  to  send  these  companies 
back  from  Fort  Larned  at  such  times  as  may  best  promote  the 
interests  and  safety  of  all  who  may  have  trains  upon  the  road 
coming  in  this  direction. 

By  command  of  General  Carleton : 

Ben.  C.  Cutler, 

Assistant  Adjutant  General. 

Carleton  provided  these  escorts  for  two  months,  but  by 
May  all  the  troops  that  could  be  spared  were  in  the  field,  and 
he  had  to  discontinue  the  service.  At  the  same  time,  however, 
he  ordered  Col.  Kit  Carson,  with  two  companies  of  the  First 
New  Mexico  Cavalry  and  a  company  of  California  Volun- 
teers, to  leave  Fort  Union  on  May  20  and  establish  a  canton- 

25.  R.  N.  Richardson,  The  Comanche  Barrier  to  South  Plains  Settlement  (Glendale, 
1933),  285-87  ;  idem.,  "The  Comanche  Indians  and  the  Fight  at  Adobe  Walls,"  Panhandle- 
Plains  Historical  Review,  IV    (1931)  ;  C.  Boone  McClure   (ed.),  "The  Battle  of  Adobe 
Walls,  1864,"  ibid.,  XXI  (1948). 

26.  Carleton  to  Maj.  Gen.  S.  R.  Curtis,  Jan.  24,  1865,  Condition  of  the  Indian  Tribes, 
215-16. 

27.  Reproduced  in  ibid.,  243. 


48  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ment  at  Cedar  Bluff  or  Cold  Spring,  on  the  Cimarron  Route. 
Carson  was  to  occupy  this  camp  until  November  1865  and 
protect  trains  passing  to  and  from  the  States.  He  was  also 
to  have  a  talk  with  the  Kiowa,  Comanche,  and  Cheyenne 
chiefs.  "Tell  them  this,"  advised  the  General.  "They  must  not 
think  to  stop  the  commerce  of  the  plains,  nor  must  they 
imagine  that  we  are  going  to  keep  up  escorts  with  trains.  We 
do  this  now  until  we  learn  whether  they  will  behave  or  not. 
If  they  will  not,  we  will  end  the  matter  by  a  war  which  will 
remove  any  further  necessity  for  escorts."28 

Near  Cedar  Spring  Carson's  men  built  Camp  Nichols,  a 
fort  consisting  of  stone  officers'  quarters  and  walled  tents  sur- 
rounded by  stone  breastworks  banked  with  earth.  The  first 
escort  left  Camp  Nichols  on  June  19  and  accompanied  a  cara- 
van of  70  wagons  to  Fort  Larned.  Carson  had  no  opportunity 
to  convey  Carleton's  sentiments  to  the  hostile  chiefs,  for  he 
was  almost  immediately  called  to  Santa  Fe  to  testify  before 
a  joint  congressional  committee  investigating  Indian  affairs. 
Maj.  Albert  H.  Pfeiffer,  his  second-in-command,  remained  to 
furnish  escorts  to  caravans  for  the  remainder  of  the  season. 
Camp  Nichols  was  presumably  abandoned  in  November  1865 
as  planned,  for  Col.  James  F.  Meline  found  it  in  ruins  the  fol- 
lowing summer.29 

Carson's  expedition  of  1865  marked  the  end  of  escort 
service  on  a  significant  scale  by  troops  from  Fort  Union.  The 
railroad  moving  west  into  Kansas  in  1866-67  caused  traffic  on 
the  Santa  Fe  Trail  to  shift  increasingly  to  the  Mountain 
Branch.  The  Army  mounted  campaigns  against  the  Kiowas, 
Comanches,  and  Cheyennes  in  1868-69  and  again  in  1874-75, 
but  not  in  the  locale  of  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  and  not  primarily 
because  of  depredations  on  the  Trail.  These  campaigns 
crushed  the  power  of  the  tribes  on  the  southern  plains.  Soon 
afterward,  the  railroad  advanced  through  Raton  Pass  into 
New  Mexico.  In  1880  the  first  engine  steamed  into  Lamy,  sta- 
tion for  Santa  Fe,  and  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  passed  into  history. 


28.  Carleton  to  Carson,  May  4,  May  8,  1865  ;  SO  No.  15,  Hq.,  Dept.  of  N.  M.,  May  7, 
1865,  in  ibid.,  225-26,  245. 

29.  E.  L.  Sabin,  Kit  Carson  Days,  1809-1868   (2  v.,  New  York,   1935),  II,  751-55; 
Aurora  Hunt,  The  Army  of  the  Pacific,  1860-1868    (Glendale,   1951),  163-65;  James  F. 
Meline,  Two  Thousand  Miles  on  Horseback  ...  in  the  Year  1866  (New  York,  1867),  269. 


SOLOMON  PERRY  SUBLETTE:  MOUNTAIN  MAN 

OF  THE  FORTIES 

i 

By  JOHN  E.  SUNDER* 

>T-IHREE  weary  Mountain  Men,  leading  a  small  string  of  pack 
JL  mules,  joined  a  larger  group  of  travelers  bedding  down  in 
the  snow  near  the  bank  of  El  Rio  de  las  Animas.  Tall,  rugged 
Solomon  Perry  Sublette  and  his  two  "clever  companions,"  Bill 
Garmon  and  Fred  Smith,  carried  government  express  dis- 
patches to  Taos  and  Santa  Fe.  The  other  adventurers  were 
several  days  out  of  Bent's  Fort  on  the  Arkansas  bound  for 
northern  New  Mexico,  determined  to  "kill  and  scalp"  anyone 
party  to  the  Taos  rising  and  recent  murder  of  Governor 
Charles  Bent.  The  year  1847  was  unpropitious  for  American 
authority  in  New  Mexico,  and  the  men  encamped  near  the 
Purgatory  that  wintry  night,  February  11,  slept  in  dangerous 
territory.1 

Lurking  Indians,  biting  wind  and  blistering  sun  were 
Western  elements  all  Mountain  Men  endured,  and  "Sol"  Sub- 
lette was  an  old  hand  who  could  take  whatever  nature  pro- 
vided. For  at  least  nine  years  he  had  wandered  the  plains  and 
mountains  from  Missouri  to  California,  Idaho  to  the  South- 
west, trapping,  trading,  exploring,  never  marrying,  never  set- 
tling down  for  more  than  a  few  months.  His  Western  exploits 
were  common  Sublette  family  fare.  At  thirty-two  he  was  the 
youngest  of  five  brothers.  William,  the  oldest,  had  died  two 
years  earlier  after  twenty  years  of  Western  activity — had 
died  a  wealthy,  highly  respected  Missourian.  Milton  was 
buried  at  Ft.  Laramie.  Pinckney  had  perished  in  an  Indian 
engagement.  Only  Andrew,  several  years  Solomon's  senior, 
was  alive,  living  in  Missouri,  preparing  to  serve  in  the  Mexi- 
can War.2 


*  The  University  of  Texas. 

1.  Lewis  H.  Garrard,  Wah-To-Yah  And  the  Taos  Trail   (Norman,  1955),  pp.  123, 
137;  Ralph  P.  Bieber  (ed.),  Wah-To-Yah  And  the  Taos  Trail  (Glendale,  1938),  pp.  200- 
201. 

2.  File  of  Andrew  W.  Sublette,  Capt.  U.  S.  A.,  1846-1848,  Records  of  the  Adjutant 
General's  Office,  Record  Group  No.  94,  MSS.,  National  Archives  ;  Daily  Missouri  Repub- 
lican (St.  Louis),  August  1,  1845;  Daily  Picayune  (New  Orleans),  December  15,  1843; 
List  of  Persons  killed  in  the  Fur  Trade,  Sublette  MSS.,  1819-1860,  Missouri  Historical 
Society,  St.  Louis  (Hereafter  cited:  Sublette  MSS). 

49 


50  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

All  of  the  brothers  were  conditioned  to  a  hardy  outdoor 
existence  by  boyhood  years  in  hilly,  sparsely-inhabited  coun- 
try. Solomon,  born  in  Lincoln  County,  Kentucky,  shortly  after 
the  War  of  1812,  was  named  for  a  maternal  uncle,  Solomon 
Whitley,  and  quite  possibly  for  Oliver  Hazard  Perry,  naval 
hero  of  the  Battle  of  Lake  Erie.  Phillip  A.  Sublette,  Solomon's 
father,  prospered  as  a  tavern  owner,  part-time  farmer,  land 
speculator  and  county  officeholder.  Isabella  Whitley,  Solo- 
mon's mother,  was  the  second  oldest  daughter  of  Colonel  Wil- 
liam Whitley,  the  renowned  Indian  fighter  and  lord  of  an 
imposing  brick  home  overlooking  the  Wilderness  Road  in  Lin- 
coln County,  Kentucky.3 

The  postwar  trans-Mississippi  land  boom  engulfed  the 
Sublettes  in  1817  and  drew  Phillip,  Isabella  and  their  children 
from  Kentucky  across  the  booming  Old  Northwest  to  the 
French  settlement  at  St.  Charles,  Missouri  Territory.  Babe- 
in-arms  Solomon  was  bundled  up  with  the  family  property 
and  carried  west.4  At  St.  Charles  his  parents  returned  to 
tavern-keeping,  operated  a  ferry  for  a  short  time  and  helped 
Americanize  the  entrenched  French  culture  of  their  newly- 
adopted  town.  Settlers  flocked  through  the  community;  fur 
traders  floated  past  the  levee  bound  for  the  rich,  virgin  trap- 
ping regions  along  the  Upper  Missouri ;  and  Solomon's  new 
world  was  a  small  child's-eye-view  of  wagon  wheels,  plod- 
ding oxen,  bemoccasined  Indian  traders  and  a  Territory  in 
transition. 

Tragedy  came  early  in  his  life  and  stayed  late.  His  par- 

3.  Solomon's   actual  year  of  birth  is   conjectural.   The  granite  shaft  marking  the 
Sublette  burial  ground  in  Bellefontaine  Cemetery,  St.  Louis,  states  that  he  was  forty-two 
years  old  at  the  time  of  his  death,  August  31,  1857.  Stella  M.  Drumm,  who  worked  for 
many  years  on  the  Sublette  Papers  in  the  Missouri  Historical  Society,  St.  Louis,  accepted 
1816  as  his  date  of  birth.  Records  in  the  Probate  Court,  St.  Charles,  Missouri,  place  him 
last  in  the  chronological  list  of  Sublette  heirs.  The  frequently  accepted  statement  that 
Pinckney   W.    Sublette   was   the   youngest   of   the   five   Sublette   brothers    seems    to   be 
inaccurate 

For  information  on  the  Sublette-Whitley  family  see  the  archives  of  Lincoln  and 
Pulaski  counties,  Kentucky,  1797-1826.  Also  see  the  Lincoln  and  Pulaski  county  tax 
lists,  at  the  Kentucky  Historical  Society,  for  the  same  period.  The  Draper  Collection  of 
Kentucky  Manuscripts  (Microfilms  of  the  Draper  Collection  in  the  State  Historical 
Society  of  Wisconsin),  1775-1845,  now  at  the  Filson  Club,  Louisville,  contains  addi- 
tional valuable  information. 

4.  St.   Charles   County   Census   Record,    1817,   MS.,   St.    Charles   County   Court,   St. 
Charles,  Missouri. 


MOUNTAIN   MAN  51 

ents  died  of  illnesses  modern  medicine  might  have  cured,  and 
he  and  his  young  sisters  and  brothers  were  entrusted  to  close 
relatives.  William  and  Milton,  the  older  boys,  entered  the  fur 
trade,  since  economic  conditions  after  the  Panic  of  1819  were 
uninviting  in  St.  Charles.  Solomon  was  taken  by  relatives  who 
had  followed  the  Sublettes  to  Missouri.5  He  matured  during 
the  eighteen-twenties  and  early  thirties — matured  and 
basked  in  the  reflected  light  cast  by  his  remarkable  brothers. 
While  he  received  a  modest  education  and  learned  to  ride, 
shoot  and  understand  the  countryside,  they  exploited  the  far 
western  fur  potential.  Since  William  was  the  oldest  brother 
and  financially  the  most  successful,  he  took  charge  of  Solo- 
mon's career  and  carefully  provided  for  him  in  his  estate.6 

In  1836  Solomon  turned  twenty-one.  William  offered  to 
establish  him  in  business.  At  first  Solomon  "could  not  make 
up  his  mind  what  course  to  pursue,"  but  through  William's 
positive  suggestions  decided  finally  to  open  a  clothing  store 
at  Independence.  The  choice  was  sound:  Independence  was 
the  outfitting  point  for  both  the  Santa  Fe  and  Oregon  trails, 
times  were  good  and  the  Sublettes  had  excellent  business  con- 
tacts in  western  Missouri.  Robert  Campbell,  William's  part- 
ner,  then  in  the  East,  purchased  an  expensive  outfit  of  shoes, 
hats,  boots  and  Indian  goods  for  the  prospective  store.  While 
Campbell  gathered  the  order,  Solomon,  to  gain  experience, 
clerked  at  Smith's  St.  Louis  clothing  shop.7 

After  a  month's  work  behind  the  counter  at  Smith's  store, 
Solomon  traveled  to  Independence  "well  reconciled  and  anx- 
ious" to  secure  an  advantageous  location  for  his  shop  and  to 
prove  to  his  family  his  business  ability.  He  found  a  desirable 
location,  opened  his  doors  in  mid-April  and  six  months  later 
granted  William  a  power  of  attorney.  Business  was  good  the 
first  year,  seemed  even  better  the  second  and  continued  pros- 
perous into  the  third.  He  restocked  items — cigars,  shaving 


5.  For  extensive  information  on  the  Sublette-Whitley  family  in  St.  Charles  see  the 
St.  Charles  County  archives,  1817-1827.  The  archives  of  Callaway  County,  Missouri,  con- 
tain many  references  to  the  McKinney  family. 

6.  Will  of  William  L.  Sublette,  1831,  Sublette  MSS. 

7.  W.  L.  Sublette  to  Robert  Campbell,  January  4,   12,  30,   February  9,   April  20, 
1836,  ibid. 


52  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

boxes,  shoes  and  socks — purchased  from  Independence  whole- 
salers, yet  he  did  not  repay  William  for  the  greater  part  of  his 
original  supply.8 

The  Panic  of  1837  set  in  motion  a  depression  wave  which 
bit  by  bit  surged  westward,  bringing  trying  times  to  Missis- 
sippi Valley  merchants.  Solomon  grew  restless  with  a  shop- 
keeper's existence.  His  St.  Louis  companions  dared  him  to 
"throw  away  [his]  .  .  .  old  hats  and  coats"  and  return  to 
mint  juleps  and  the  ladies.  Since  he  disliked  keeping  shop,  he 
closed  his  door,  sold  William  his  "negro  man  Cato,"  whom  he 
had  purchased  in  Independence,  and  substituted  parties  and 
cards  for  a  merchant's  life.9 

During  the  spring  and  early  summer  of  1838  he  visited 
Arkansas  and  Louisiana  and  sold  a  jack  and  several  mules 
at  Natchitoches.  He  liked  stock-trading  enough  to  return  to 
St.  Louis  where  William  agreed  to  support  his  new  equestrian 
interest.  With  a  "drove  of  horses"  in  hand,  Solomon  set  out 
for  New  Orleans  and  the  "Southern  Country."  His  success 
was  very  limited,  however,  in  fact  too  limited  to  be  promising, 
and  he  dashed  to  St.  Louis,  leaving  horses  and  mules  at  Wash- 
ington, Arkansas,  to  be  sold  by  a  friend.10 

As  might  be  expected  he  did  not  return  to  Arkansas,  but 
parted  company  with  William  in  St.  Louis,  hurried  to  Inde- 
pendence and,  by  late  spring,  1839,  was  on  his  way  to  Santa 
Fe.11  William  had  spent  over  three  hundred  dollars  financing 
his  young  brother's  unproductive  southern  ventures.  Solo- 
mon's outstanding  debt  to  William  was  well  over  three  thou- 
sand dollars  by  that  time,  although  Sublette  and  Campbell 
held  him  responsible  for  only  his  clothing  store  accounts.12 

In  the  West,  Solomon  criss-crossed  the  countryside  be- 

8.  S.  P.  Sublette  Power  of  Attorney  to  W.  L.  Sublette,   October  17,   1836,  ibid.; 
Bill  of  J.  Basey(  ?)  to  S.  P.  Sublette,  1837,  ibid. 

9.  Note  of  S.  P.  Sublette  to  Sublette  and  Campbell,  December  1,  1838,  t'btd.;  I.  T. 
Peck  to  S.  Sublette,  June  28,  1836,  ibid.;  Bill  of  Sale  from  S.  Sublette  to  W.  L.  Sublette, 
July  18,  1838,  ibid. 

10.  Sublette  and  Campbell  to  W.  D.  Stewart,  February  8,  1839,  ibid.;  J.  Walsh  to 
S.  T.  McAllister,  February  8,  1839,  ibid.:  S.  P.  Sublette  to  T.  Sharp,  May  2,  1838,  ibid.; 
Order  of  S.  P.  to  W.  L.  Sublette  on  T.  Sharp  for  R.  Guin,  1839,  ibid.;  J.  S.  Burt  to  W. 
L.   Sublette,   December   9,    1839,   t'btd.;   S.    P.   Sublette   to  John    Chinowth(?),   May    8, 
1839,  ibid. 

11.  S.  P.  to  W.  L.  Sublette,  May  1.  1839,  ibid.;  W.  L.  Sublette  to  T.  Sharp,  May  14, 
1839,  ibid. 

12.  Balance  Sheet  from  Sublette  and  Campbell  Ledger,  December  1,  1842,  ibid. 


MOUNTAIN   MAN  53 

tween  Santa  Fe  and  Bent's  Fort.  For  three  years  he  trapped, 
traded  and  lived  off  the  land,  perhaps  working  closely  with 
Louis  Vasquez  and  Andrew  Sublette,  then  trading  on  the 
Upper  Platte  and  Arkansas.  The  termination  of  their  part- 
nership possibly  influenced  his  decision  to  return  to  Missouri 
to  "get  some  assistance."  From  Taos  he  moved  northeastward 
to  Bent's  Fort,  joined  a  small  party  under  Joseph  Williams 
returning  from  Oregon  and  was  in  Independence  late  in  Octo- 
ber, 1842.13 

Undecided  as  usual  about  his  future,  he  rejected  a  friend's 
proposal  that  he  return  to  the  Southwest  and  offer  his  services 
to  the  Texas  Republic.  Instead,  he  lingered  in  Independence 
during  early  November,  1842,  investigating  the  produce  mar- 
ket for  William.  Solomon  "had  no  means"  to  do  otherwise  and 
intimated  that  Andrew  had  broken  an  old,  though  question- 
able, promise  to  assist  him  financially.  William  was  in  western 
Missouri  on  business  later  in  the  month,  met  Solomon,  paid 
at  least  one  of  his  outstanding  bills  and  accompanied  him  east- 
ward to  a  family  reunion  at  the  large  Sublette  farm — Sulphur 
Springs — in  St.  Louis  County.14 

Spring  arrived  late ;  its  days  filled  with  grief  and  frenzied 
activity.  Sophronia,  the  last  of  three  Sublette  sisters,  was  ill 
during  the  winter  and  died  suddenly  in  April.15  William  pre- 
pared to  join  Sir  William  Drummond  Stewart  and  a  large 
group  of  friends  in  a  "pleasure"  trip  to  the  valley  of  Green 
River ;  Andrew  was  in  poor  health ;  and  the  Hereford  family, 
new  lessees  of  resort  facilities  at  Sulphur  Springs,  were  busy 
with  management  details.  Solomon  decided  to  accompany  Wil- 
liam to  the  Green  and  was  sent  to  western  Missouri  to  collect 
debts  owed  Sublette  and  Campbell  and  to  purchase  livestock 
for  the  expedition.  In  May  he  joined  William's  party  near 
Independence.16 

13.  S.  P.  to  W.  L.  Sublette,  October  29,  1842,  ibid.;  Joseph  Williams,  Narrative  of 
a  Tour  from  the  State  of  Indiana  to  the  Oregon  Territory  in  the  Years  1841-42   (New 
York,  1921),  pp.  86,  88. 

14.  S.  P.  to  W.  L.  Sublette,  October  31,  November  28,  1842,  Sublette  MSS. ;  A.  W. 
to  W.  L.  Sublette,  December  9,  21,  1842,  ibid.;  Receipts  of  S.  Noland(?)    and  Samuel 
C.  Owens  to  S.  P.  Sublette,  October  29,  December  13,  1842,  ibid. 

15.  Daily  Missouri  Republican  (St.  Louis),  April  21,  1843. 

16.  Stella  M.  Drumm  and  Isaac  H.  Lionberger    (eds. ),  "Correspondence  of  Robert 
Campbell  1834-1845,"  Glimpses  of  the  Past,  VII    (January- June,   1941),  50,  53,  55-56; 
Instructions  for  S.  P.  Sublette  from  Sublette  and  Campbell,  1843,  Sublette  MSS. 


54  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

The  Stewart-Sublette  group,  a  bit  in  advance  of  a  large 
Oregon-bound  contingent  of  settlers,  headed  across  the 
muddy  prairies  towards  the  Platte.  Solomon  took  charge  of  a 
small  outfit  under  Jesuit  fathers  Peter  De  Vos  and  Adrian 
Hoecken,  traveling  with  the  pleasure  party  to  Flathead  In- 
dian missionary  work.  From  eastern  Kansas  to  Ft.  Laramie 
the  combined  expedition  frolicked  across  the  plains  on  clear, 
sunny  days  and  grumbled  in  the  rain.  They  celebrated  the 
Fourth  of  July  on  the  Platte  and  a  few  days  later  rolled  onto 
Laramie  plain.17 

Solomon  remained  at  the  fort  when  the  expedition  left  on 
July  8 — remained  to  erect  a  more  Christian  monument  over 
his  brother  Milton  Sublette's  last  resting  place.  The  old,  crude 
wooden  cross  was  broken,  badly  in  need  of  repairs.18  He  spent 
most  of  the  summer  at  or  near  Ft.  Laramie  and  in  the  autumn 
took  a  supply  of  Indian  trade  goods  down  to  the  South  Platte 
and  Upper  Arkansas.  Meanwhile,  in  November  William  re- 
turned to  St.  Louis,  pleased  with  his  trip,  yet  in  failing  health. 
On  New  Year's  Day,  1844,  he  drew  up  a  new  will,  bequeath- 
ing most  of  his  valuable  property  to  Andrew,  Solomon  and 
Frances  S.  Hereford,  his  "estimed  [sic']  female  friend"  and 
future  wife.19 

William — perhaps  responsible  for  financing  Solomon's 
outfit  to  the  Upper  Arkansas — received  frequent  letters  dur- 
ing 1844  from  his  younger  brother.  Solomon  reported  in  the 
spring  that  "trade  is  a  ragin  [sic"]  very  high  there  is  a  plenty 
of  goods  and  very  few  robes."  The  Indians  had  "stolled  [his] 
horse,"  another  horse  had  distemper  and,  he  added,  that  on 
one  occasion  he  walked  fifty  miles  from  an  Indian  village  to 
his  camp  for  lack  of  proper  transportation.  Trade  to  Santa 
Fe  was  hampered  by  political  difficulties,  but  he  remarked 
to  friends  that  he  might  spend  the  summer  in  Spanish  country 


17.  M.  C.  Field  Diary  of  1843,  Entries  of  June  and  July,  MSS.,  Missouri  Historical 
Society.  Also  see  the  M.  C.  Field  sketches  published  in  the  Daily  Picayune    (New  Or- 
leans), 1843,  and  reproduced  in  Kate  L.  Gregg  and  John  F.  McDermott   (eds. ),  Prairie 
and  Mountain  Sketches,  Norman,  1957. 

18.  Daily  Picayune  (New  Orleans),  December  IB,  1843;  M.  C.  Field  Diary  of  1843, 
Entry  of  July  5.  MSS.,  Missouri  Historical  Society ;  Gregg  and  McDermott,  op.  cit.,  p.  78. 

19.  S.  P.  to  W.  L.  Sublette,  February  2,  1844,  Sublette  MSS. ;  Last  Will  and  Testa- 
ment of  W.  L.  Sublette,  January  1,  1844,  ibid. 


MOUNTAIN   MAN  55 

and  return  to  the  Arkansas  later  in  the  year.  He  suggested 
that  William  join  him  in  the  mountains  for  the  summer — f or 
his  health,  not  for  trade,  since  trade  continued  erratic.  Unless 
he  could  "get  some  business"  in  St.  Louis,  Solomon  intended 
to  remain  where  he  was  in  the  West.20 

Instead  of  going  to  Santa  Fe  for  the  summer  he  plunged 
into  the  Colorado  Rockies  to  hunt  sheep  and  antelopes  to  send 
to  William's  farm.  In  early  October  he  reached  Ft.  Pueblo, 
having  completed  his  hunt,  and  on  the  twentieth  of  the  month 
was  at  Taos  to  lay  in  winter  provisions.  He  had  not  heard 
from  William  in  nearly  a  year  and  a  half  and  feared  that  his 
older  brother  might  be  quite  angry  over  unpaid  debts.  An- 
drew, who  had  returned  to  the  West  that  year  for  his  health, 
joined  Solomon,  on  the  South  Platte  or  at  Bent's  Fort,  and 
passed  the  time  with  him  in  Taos.  Solomon  envied  Andrew's 
farming  experience — the  "happiest  life  that  a  man  can  lead" 
— but  Andrew,  freed  by  the  mountain  air  from  his  persistent 
cough,  did  not  intend  to  return  permanently  to  the  Sublette 
farm.21 

The  two  brothers  were  back  on  the  South  Platte  before 
winter  made  travel  difficult.  As  soon  as  the  snow  cleared  in 
March,  Solomon  went  to  Taos  for  provisions  and  returned 
to  meet  Andrew  who  was  following  the  buffalo  along  the  Ar- 
kansas. Both  had  considered  a  jaunt  to  California,  but  An- 
drew decided  to  return  to  Missouri  that  summer.  Solomon 
sent  William  "10  or  12  pounds  of  Beaver  and  Forty  Dollars" 
to  settle  some  of  his  debts  and  turned  westward  to  pick  up 
the  California  Trail.  His  brother-in-law,  Grove  Cook,  whom 
Sophronia  had  divorced  two  years  before  her  death,  was  in 
California  and  Solomon  intended  possibly  to  "establish  him- 
self [there]  when  he  [liked]  the  Country.  .  .  ,"22 


20.  S.  P.  to  W.  L.  Sublette,  February  2,  April  18,  May  5,  1844,  ibid.  Solomon  may 
have  been  employed  by  Bent  and  St.   Vrain  in  the  years  1843-1845.   See  Harrison   C. 
Dale,  "A  Fragmentary  Journal  of  William  L.  Sublette,"  Mississippi  Valley  Historical 
Review,  I  No.  1  (June,  1919),  105. 

21.  A.  W.  to  W.  L.  Sublette,   October  20,   1844,   Sublette  MSS. ;  Receipt  of  S.   P. 
Sublette  at  Fort  Pueblo,  October  9,  1844,  ibid;  S.  P.  to  W.  L.  Sublette,  May  5,  October  20, 
1844,  and  S.  P.  to  A.  W.  Sublette,  May  5,  1844,  ibid. 

22.  A.  W.  to  W.  L.  Sublette,  March  3,  April  6,  1845,  ibid.;  George  P.  Hammond 
(ed.),  The  Larkin  Papers  (Berkeley  and  Los  Angeles,  1953),  IV,  p.  10. 


56  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

He  and  a  party  of  fifteen  crossed  rapidly  to  California, 
passing  at  least  two  groups  of  emigrants  along  the  way.  On 
October  7,  Solomon  reached  New  Helvetia  (Sutter's  Fort) 
and  was  welcomed  by  Sutter  himself  who  concluded  that  the 
youngest  Sublette  was  "a  Man  of  considerable  property." 
Either  Sutter  was  deceived  or  Solomon  had  profited  greatly 
during  his  months  between  Taos  and  the  South  Platte.  He 
and  some  of  his  party  moved  to  Yerba  Buena  (San  Fran- 
cisco) where  they  celebrated  the  holidays  in  high  style.  Late 
on  Christmas  Eve  they  "made  a  great  hurahing"  outside  the 
door  of  William  A.  Leidesdorff,  one  of  the  more  prominent 
local  merchants.  Later  that  night  Solomon,  no  doubt  in  his 
cups,  returned  to  abuse  the  merchant  "shamefully,  telling 
him  that  he  had  struck  terror  through  all  the  towns  he  had 
been  at,  and  would  strike  terror  through  [him]  before  he  left 
[that]  town."  Then  with  a  flourish  he  tossed  two  large  stones 
on  Leidesdorff' s  adobe  bungalow  roof  and  went  his  happy 
way!23 

Seven  months  in  California  convinced  Solomon  that  his 
future  was  not  on  the  Pacific  Coast.  He  surveyed  possibilities 
in  land  and  livestock,  probably  visited  Grove  Cook  and  his 
new  bride,  Rebecca  Kelsey  Cook,  either  at  their  Santa  Cruz 
home  or  at  Sutter's  Fort,  and  decided  to  return  to  Missouri. 
Possibly  he  had  news  of  William's  death  the  previous  July 
and  believed  he  should  participate  in  the  estate  settlement. 
William  had  dictated  a  new  will  the  day  before  his  death, 
designating  Robert  Campbell  and  Andrew  as  executors.  Solo- 
mon was  granted  considerable  real  and  personal  property. 
During  the  winter,  while  he  abused  merchants,  his  brother's 
will  was  in  probate.24 

Late  in  May  Solomon  and  ten  others,  under  hire  as  herds- 
men to  Joseph  Reddeford  Walker,  drove  eighty  mules  and 
horses  from  Pueblo  de  Los  Angeles  eastward  over  Walker 


23.  Hammond   (ed.),  op.  cit.,  pp.  10,  150;  H.  H.  Bancroft,  The  Works  of  Hubert 
Howe  Bancroft  (San  Francisco,  1886),  XXI,  pp.  577-578 ;  New  Helvetia  Diary  of  Event* 
from  1845-48  (San  Francisco,  1939),  pp.  5-6. 

24.  J.  A.  Sutter  to  S.  P.  Sublette,  December  22,  1845,  Sublette  MSS. ;  Last  Will  and 
Testament  of  W.  L.  Sublette,  July  22,  1845,  ibid.  See  also  Record  of  Wills  C,  1840-1850, 
pp.  181-182,  MSS.,  St.  Louis  Probate  Court,  St.  Louis.  For  the  story  of  Solomon's  Cali- 
fornia venture  see  Doyce  B.  Nunis,  Jr.,  "The  Enigma  of  the  Sublette  Overland  Party, 
1845,"  Pacific  Historical  Review,  XXVIII  No.  4  (November,  1959),  331-349. 


MOUNTAIN   MAN  57 

Pass  through  the  Sierras  to  the  Humboldt  and  on  to  Ft.  Hall. 
Walker  rested  his  herd  at  the  fort,  but  Solomon  and  three 
friends  pushed  on  to  Ft.  Bridger  and  Ft.  Laramie.  Since  pro- 
visions were  low  at  Laramie  and  the  neighboring  Sioux  were 
touchy,  Solomon's  tiny  party  turned  south  along  the  front 
range  and  reached  Bent's  Fort  in  mid-August.  There  they 
joined  a  party  heading  east  along  the  Santa  Fe  Trail.  Three 
weeks  later  Solomon  rode  into  Weston,  Missouri,  and  took 
passage  on  the  steamboat  Little  Missouri  for  St.  Louis,  arriv- 
ing about  September  10.25 

Andrew,  Frances,  and  Solomon  worked  steadily  through- 
out the  autumn  on  pressing  items  in  William's  estate.  Solo- 
mon inherited  a  smaU  herd  of  prize  cattle ;  wearing  apparel ; 
William's  "largest  double  barrel  gun" ;  one-half  of  William's 
land  in  Cole  County,  Missouri,  including  town  lots  in  Jeffer- 
son City ;  and  approximately  one-fourth  of  his  brother's  seven 
hundred  acres  of  improved  St.  Louis  County  land.  By  the  will 
he  was  freed  of  all  debts  with  the  exception  of  a  small  sum 
due  Robert  Campbell.26 

The  estate  brought  Solomon  only  temporary  security ;  he 
was  soon  in  debt  and  his  spirit  roamed  westward.  Despite  a 
siege  of  ill  health,  he  accepted  an  appointment  to  carry  gov- 
ernment dispatches  to  Taos  and  Santa  Fe — not  an  enviable 
duty — beginning  late  in  1846.  From  Ft.  Leavenworth,  the  day 
before  departure,  he  wrote  Frances  that  her  presence  in  St. 
Louis  the  previous  autumn  brought  him  great  happiness. 
"You  may  look  for  my  return  in  due  time,"  he  promised,  and 
asked  her  to  discount  any  rumors  she  might  hear  of  his  death. 
He  intended  fully  to  return,  court  and  win  his  brother's  at- 
tractive widow.27 

Throughout  January  and  early  February,  1847,  Solomon's 
small  party  tramped  over  heavy  snow  across  Indian  country 
along  the  Arkansas  to  Bent's  Fort.  Their  mules  subsisted  on 
ice-encrusted  dry  grass  and  strips  of  cottonwood  bark.  At 
Bent's  Fort  they  heard  of  the  Taos  rising,  and  Solomon  "made 


25.  Daily  Missouri  Republican   (St.  Louis),  September  11,  1846;  Francis  Parkman, 
The  Oregon  Trail  (Garden  City,  1946),  pp.  242-243,  264. 

26.  Last  Will  and   Testament  of  W.   L.   Sublette,   July   22,    1845,    Sublette   MSS. ; 
File  of  Estate  of  William  L.  Sublette,  File  2052,  MSS.,  St.  Louis  Probate  Court. 

27.  S.  P.  to  F.  S.  Sublette,  January  7,  1847,  Sublette  MSS. 


58  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

application  .  .  .  for  an  additional  force"  which  he  was  to 
meet  south  of  the  Fort.  The  force  materialized  unequipped, 
and  Solomon  holed  up  near  the  Purgatory  to  wait  out  the 
insurrection.  Fortunately,  he  learned  from  a  traveler  that  the 
rising  was  subdued.  Reaching  Taos,  he  delivered  a  precious 
packet  of  dispatches  to  Colonel  Sterling  Price  and,  after  a 
visit  to  Santa  Fe,  headed  home  late  in  March.  Two  months 
later  he  reached  Ft.  Leavenworth.28 

Before  leaving  for  the  Southwest  he  petitioned  Senator 
Thomas  Hart  Benton  of  Missouri  for  "some  .  .  .  appoint- 
ment in  the  Indian  country."  Solomon  had  in  mind  specifically 
an  Indian  agency  on  the  Missouri.  He  reminded  Senator  Ben- 
ton  of  his  years  of  residence  "amongst  the  tribes  and  his 
service  in  California,"  which  suggests  that  Solomon  played 
a  part  in  California  politics  during  the  winter  of  1845-46. 
The  Senator,  an  old  friend  of  William  Subletted,  promised 
help  and  a  few  months  after  Solomon's  return  from  Santa 
Fe  offered  him  the  agency  for  the  "United  tribe  of  Sacs  & 
Foxes  of  the  Mississippi."  Solomon  accepted,  at  a  yearly  sal- 
ary of  fifteen  hundred  dollars,  and  was  assigned  through 
Thomas  A.  Harvey,  Superintendent  of  Indian  Affairs  at  St. 
Louis  and  an  old  Sublette  family  political  adversary.29 

His  appointment  was  greeted  by  the  press  with  "general 
satisfaction"  and  the  expectation  of  efficiency.  Certainly  he 
possessed  enough  experience  to  undertake  the  job,  yet  in  less 
than  a  year  he  resigned.  Writing  to  the  Office  of  Indian  Af- 
fairs on  April  18,  1848,  he  relinquished  his  position.  He  was 
compelled  to  do  so  through  "continued  sickness,"  he  said,  but 
the  possibility  remains  that  politics,  the  instability  of  his 
personality,  new  business  prospects  and  his  intention  to  take 
Frances  as  his  wife  were  of  greater  consequence.30  Frances, 
who  had  "rather  bad  luck"  with  the  Sublette  farm  during  the 
winter,  had  accepted  Solomon's  proposal.31 

28.  Ibid.,  May  1,  1847,  ibid.  This  letter  is  reproduced  in  Bieber  (ed.),  op.  eit.,  p.  200. 

29.  S.   P.   Sublette  to  Sen.   T.   H.   Benton,   December  11,   16,   1846,   Sublette  MSS. ; 
U.  S.  War  Department  to  S.  P.  Sublette,  October  21,  1847,  ibid. 

30.  S.  P.  Sublette  to  Col.  W.  Medill,  April  18,  1848,  ibid.;  Jefferson  Inquirer  (Jef- 
ferson City),  November  6,  1847. 

31.  Theresa  Hereford  to  S.  P.  Sublette,  January  30-February  1,  1848,  Sublette  MSS. ; 
S.  P.  to  F.  S.  Sublette,  April  28,  1848,  tbtd. 


MOUNTAIN   MAN  59 

Solomon  joined  Frances  at  Independence  and  on  May  21, 
1848,  married  her  in  a  quiet  ceremony  at  the  Southern  Meth- 
odist Episcopal  Church.  They  were  "busily  engaged  prepar- 
ing to  leave"  for  California  and  had  placed  friends  in  charge 
of  the  Sublette  farm  and  William's  unsettled  estate.  By  June 
1,  they  were  ready  to  depart ;  then,  at  the  last  minute,  can- 
celled their  plans.  Frances  was  seriously  ill.  Solomon  re- 
mained at  her  side  until  she  recovered  partially,  but 
sufficiently  to  permit  him  to  enter  the  Santa  Fe  trade.32 

Frances'  brother,  Thomas  Hereford,  had  persuaded  Solo- 
mon to  join  him  and  transport  an  expensive  line  of  merchan- 
dise to  Santa  Fe.  Solomon  agreed  to  the  business  proposal 
and  made  the  overland  crossing  to  New  Mexico,  although  he 
"never  wanted  to  commence  the  trade."  In  the  autumn  of  1848 
he  returned  briefly  to  St.  Louis  on  a  "pleasure  trip,"  but  was 
again  in  Santa  Fe  by  mid-May  of  1849.  There  he  learned  that 
his  southwestern  affairs  were  disordered  and  that  his  goods 
were  at  market  in  Mexico. 

He  joined  his  partner  in  Chihuahua  where  dull  business 
followed  unpromising  prices.  After  selling  their  carryalls  and 
a  few  draught  animals,  the  partners  awaited  impatiently  the 
arrival  of  new  goods.  Hereford  offered  to  sell  out  to  Solomon, 
but  Solomon  refused  and  agreed  instead  to  a  mutual  dissolu- 
tion of  partnership.  He  was  tired  of  the  calico  trade  and  was 
anxious  to  be  in  Missouri  before  winter.  While  Hereford  re- 
mained in  Chihuahua  to  settle  business  accounts  and  gather 
a  herd  of  mules  to  drive  to  California,  Solomon  returned  to 
a  mortgaged  home  at  Sulphur  Springs.33 

He  reached  St.  Louis  possibly  in  time  for  the  birth  of  Solo- 
mon Perry,  Jr.,  his  first  child,  shortly  before  Christmas.  The 
following  spring  he  made  a  short  business  trip  to  New  Or- 
leans and,  in  his  absence,  his  son's  health  grew  precarious  and 
he  arrived  home  to  find  him  near  death.  The  boy  died  of  a 


82.  Record  1,  2  &  3,  p.  173,  MSS.,  Jackson  County  Recorder  of  Deeds  Office,  Inde- 
pendence, Missouri ;  S.  P.  to  F.  S.  Sublette,  April  28,  1848,  April  21,  1849,  Sublette  MSS. ; 
F.  S.  Sublette  to  M.  Tarver,  May  27,  1848,  ibid. ;  Memorandum  of  Agreement  with  George 
Glass,  June  6,  1848,  ibid. 

33.  S.  P.  to  F.  S.  Sublette,  September  8,  1849,  ibid.;  S.  P.  Sublette  to  M.  Tarver, 
May  29,  1849,  ibid.;  T.  A.  Hereford  to  S.  P.  Sublette,  March  9,  1850,  ibid. 


60  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

persistent  cough — possibly  consumption — on  April  24,  and 
was  interred  at  the  Sublette  burial  ground  on  the  farm.34 

There  were  few  bright  spots  in  Solomon's  later  years.  He 
and  Frances  attempted  to  make  a  living  from  the  soil,  but 
were  land-saturated,  incapable  of  deriving  a  large  income 
from  their  inherited  holdings.  Friends  and  relatives,  always 
ready  to  request  assistance,  believed  the  Sublettes  were  ex- 
tremely wealthy.  Instead,  Solomon  could  give  their  pleas  little 
attention.  He  did  not  have  the  means,  and  the  strong,  deep 
tragic  current  in  his  life  ran  full  at  the  end.  Frances  was  sel- 
dom in  good  health,  her  conditioned  weakened  by  the  birth 
of  two  children,  Esther  Frances  and  William  Hugh  Sublette. 
Young  William  died  at  seventeen  months.  Esther  Frances 
survived  her  parents,  but  died  at  the  age  of  seven.35  Frances 
succumbed  after  a  prolonged  illness  on  September  28,  1857, 
but  fortunately  Solomon  was  spared  that  final  grief,  since  he 
preceded  her  in  death  by  four  weeks.36  In  his  forty-two  years 
of  life  he  had  missed  success  and  happiness.  He  did,  however, 
realize  that  his  Western  experiences  would  be  useful  to  writ- 
ers such  as  Joseph  Ware,  compiler  of  an  emigrants'  guide  in 
1849,  who  found  Solomon  a  ready  source  of  Western 
information.37 

In  retrospect  modern  psychiatry  could  find  in  Solomon's 
life  an  interesting  study.  Orphaned  at  an  early  age  and  en- 
trusted to  relatives  for  many  years,  he  matured  too  late  to 
follow  profitably  his  brothers'  vocation.  His  life  was  over- 
shadowed by  their  success,  and  he  was  unable  to  find  security, 
satisfaction  or  an  answer  to  his  "destiny  neurosis."  At  Wil- 
liam's death  the  only  strong  guiding  hand  in  his  life  was  lost. 
"During  his  life  time,"  Solomon  wrote  despondently,  "I  had 
a  friend  and  one  that  would  do  any  thing  to  assist  me,  in  pro- 


34.  F.  S.  to  S.  P.  Sublette,  March  2,  1851,  ibid.;  In  the  Supreme  Court  of  Missouri, 
October  Term,  190S,  Division  No.  1,  p.  159.  See  also  the  Sublette  burial  ground  marker, 
Bellefontaine  Cemetery,  St.  Louis. 

35.  Sallie  Hereford  to  S.  P.  and  F.  S.  Sublette,  December  16,  1853,  Sublette  MSS. ; 
M.  L.  to  S.  P.  Sublette ( ?),  August  12,  1852,  ibid.;  In  the  Supreme  Court  .  .  .,  pp.  169- 
160. 

36.  Files  of  Estates  of  Solomon   P.   Sublette,   File  5072,  and  Frances   S.   Sublette, 
File  5073,  MSS.,  St.  Louis  Probate  Court. 

37.  Joseph  E.  Ware,   The  Emigrants'  Guide  to  California    (St.  Louis,   1849),   pp. 
xxiii,  26. 


MOUNTAIN   MAN  61 

moting  happiness,  reputation,  &  prosperity,  he  loved  me  as  a 
father  would  a  Son,  it  was  one  of  the  greatest  calamities  that 
ever  fell  to  the  lot  of  men  the  day  I  lost  him."38  Dogged  by  per- 
sonal tragedy,  Solomon  Sublette  surrendered  to  failure  and 
died  as  the  new  West  of  miner,  cowhand  and  farmer  replaced 
the  West  of  the  Mountain  Men. 


38.  S.  P.  Sublette  to  M.  Tarver,  March  19,  1849,  Sublette  MSS. ;  John  E.  Sunder, 
Bill  Sublette :  Mountain  Man,  Norman,  1959  ;  Franz  Alexander,  Our  Age  of  Unreason, 
New  York  and  Philadelphia,  1942. 


LEW  WALLACE'S  BEN  HUR 
By  JACKSON  E.  TOWNE 


OLIVER  LAFARGE,  in  his  "Santa  Fe.  The  Autobiography  of 
a  Southwestern  Town,"  speaks  of  General  Lew  Wallace 
as  the  "first  recorded  member  of  the  town's  art  colony,"  for 
Wallace  wrote  the  sixth,  seventh  and  eighth  books  of  the 
novel  "Ben  Hur"  in  the  Palace  of  the  Governors  at  Santa  Fe 
while  serving  as  Territorial  Governor  of  New  Mexico  from 
1878  to  1881. 

The  present  writer  well  remembers  how  Dr.  Edgar  L. 
Hewett,  as  a  former  Director  of  the  Museum  of  New  Mexico 
had  assembled  a  number  of  interesting  relics  pertaining  to 
Lew  Wallace,  including  the  General's  morris  chair  with  lap 
board  on  which  he  wrote ;  his  bronze  bust,  presented  to  the 
institution  by  his  son,  Henry  Wallace;  portraits,  with  one 
of  the  General  wearing  the  rather  too  long  beard  which  he 
affected  in  the  1870's ;  copies  of  some  of  his  most  important 
executive  orders ;  a  set  of  his  most  important  works ;  and  the 
letter  certifying  to  the  portions  of  "Ben  Hur"  written  in  the 
Palace,  as  follows : 

(although  the  letter  is  dated  from  Crawfordsville,  Indiana, 
"May  6th,  '90,"  the  General  wrote  on  stationery  bearing  the 
letterhead  of  the  "Territory  of  New  Mexico,  Office  of  the 
Secretary,  Santa  Fe") 
Dear  Sir : 

Touching  your  inquiry  whether  "Ben-Hur"  was  written 
in  the  old  palace  of  Santa  Fe,  I  beg  to  say  it  was  finished 
there.  That  is,  the  MS.  was  completed  at  the  same  time  of  my 
appointment  to  the  governorship  of  New  Mexico  (1877),  down 
to  the  sixth  book  of  the  volume,  and  I  carried  it  with  me. 

When  in  the  city,  my  habit  was  to  shut  myself  after  night, 
in  the  bedroom  back  of  the  executive  office  proper,  and  write 
till  after  12  o'clock.  The  sixth,  seventh  and  eighth  books  were 
the  result,  and  the  room  has  ever  since  been  associated  in  my 
mind  with  the  Crucifixion.  The  retirement,  impenetrable  to 
incoming  sound,  was  as  profound  as  a  cavern's. 

Very  respectfully. 

(Signed)  Lew  Wallace 

62 


BEN   HUR  63 

"Ben  Hur"  is  not  a  great  historical  novel,  it  cannot  be 
compared  with  "Quo  Vadis"  or  with  "War  and  Peace."  But 
"Ben  Hur"  has  had  by  far  the  most  financially  successful 
series  of  dramatizations  for  stage  and  screen  of  any  novel 
written  anywhere.  The  technicolor  production  released  by  the 
Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer  company  and  premiered  in  New  York 
City  at  Loew's  State  Theatre  on  November  16,  1959,  is  confi- 
dently predicted  to  prove  the  most  profitable  single  film  in 
the  entire  history  of  the  motion  picture  industry.  The  Metro 
production  is  expected  to  surpass  the  financial  record  of 
Paramount's  "The  Ten  Commandments,"  reputed  to  have 
earned  $27,000,000  in  its  first  19  months  of  showing;  and  a 
figure  of  $30,000,000  for  "Ben  Hur"  has  been  quoted  in 
Variety. 

The  earnings  of  "Ben  Hur"  have  certainly  been  out  of  all 
proportion  to  the  quality  of  the  original  novel.  Has  it  been 
the  chariot  race  that  has  been  such  an  attraction?  We  can  ac- 
count for  some  of  the  latest  success  because  of  wisely  chosen 
adapters,  such  as  Maxwell  Anderson,  S.  N.  Behrman,  Chris- 
topher Fry  and  Gore  Vidal ;  looking  backward,  we  can  highly 
credit  the  competent  acting  of  such  old  stage  players  as  Wil- 
liam H.  Farnum,  Conway  Tearle  and  William  S.  Hart,  and 
currently,  again,  much  praise  is  doubtless  due  such  effective 
screen  players  as  Charlton  Heston,  Sam  Jaffe  and  Finlay 
Currie;  but  are  these  factors  sufficient  to  explain  the  enor- 
mous earnings?  There  remains  an  enigma  for  the  serious 
theatre  and  screen  critic.  In  the  meantime,  the  record  in  mere 
quantitative  terms  is  certainly  striking. 

"Ben  Hur"  was  published  as  a  novel  by  Joseph  Henry 
Harper  of  the  well-known  firm  of  Harpers  of  New  York  on 
November  12,  1880.  A  contract  was  signed  which  gave  the 
author  a  10  per  cent  royalty.  In  the  first  seven  months  after 
publication  the  novel  only  sold  about  2,800  copies,  earning 
for  Wallace  less  than  $300.  (The  book  was  priced  at  a  dollar 
and  a  half.)  By  1883  Wallace  wrote  to  his  son  that  he  hoped 
for  $100  a  year  from  "Ben  Hur"  and  the  earlier  novel  of  the 
conquest  of  Mexico,  "The  Fair  God,"  together.  During  the 
initial  months  after  publication  some  of  the  harshest  and 
shrewdest  criticisms  of  "Ben  Hur"  appeared.  For  a  balanced, 


64  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

academic  judgment  of  the  story  the  reader  is  referred  to  Carl 
Van  Doren's  strictures  in  his  "The  American  Novel"  pub- 
lished some  fifteen  years  after  Wallace's  death. 

Following  a  slow  start,  sales  of  "Ben  Hur"  began  to  boom, 
and  as  Irving  McKee  puts  it  in  his  popular  biography  of  Wal- 
lace :  "the  rill  became  a  brook,  the  brook  a  river,  the  river  a 
flood."  And  Mr.  McKee  summarizes : 


Schools,  colleges  and  clubs  without  number  swam  with  the  tide 
and  swelled  it;  as  no  other  novel  it  was  good  for  the  young, 
the  impressionable,  the  wayward.  By  the  close  of  1889,  400,000 
copies  had  been  sold,  and  there  was  no  sign  of  a  slackening.  In 
1890  various  newspapers,  perhaps  on  the  authority  of  Harpers, 
said  it  had  outsold  Uncle  Tom's  Cabin.  ...  By  1911  a  million 
authorized  Ben-Hurs  had  been  disposed  of,  not  to  mention 
pirated  copies  in  England  and  Germany.  It  was  translated  into 
German,  French,  Swedish,  Bohemian,  Turkish,  Italian,  Span- 
ish, Portuguese,  Arabic,  and  Lithuanian,  and  printed  in 
Braille.  .  .  .  Harpers  in  1944  estimated  that  at  least  2,500,000 
copies  had  been  sold. . . . 

In  due  course,  Wallace  was  besieged  with  offers  for  the 
dramatization  of  "Ben  Hur."  He  was  in  correspondence  with 
a  number  of  famous  actors  about  it,  with  Lawrence  Barrett 
and  Alexander  Salvini ;  and  Henry  Irving  once  seriously  con- 
sidered attempting  the  role  of  Simonides  which  is  so  ably 
played  by  Sam  Jaff  e  in  the  current  film  version.  No  first  rate 
dramatists  applied,  and  in  1899  Wallace  agreed  to  a  produc- 
tion to  be  directed  by  one  Joseph  Brooks  of  the  firm  of  Klaw 
and  Erlanger,  with  the  story  to  be  adapted  by  one  William 
Young  of  Chicago.  Wallace's  royalties  were  to  be  double  those 
he  had  received  from  Harpers.  Claude  L.  Hagen  designed  a 
machine  to  manipulate  "waves"  in  the  naval  scene,  tread- 
mills for  the  chariot  race  (a  refinement  of  the  mechanism 
used  previously  in  the  Klaw  and  Erlanger  production  of  "The 
County  Fair,"  written  by  Charles  Barnard  and  Neil  Bur- 
gess) ,  and  a  moving  panorama  of  the  arena. 

The  Young  adaptation  involved  thirteen  scenes  in  six 
acts :  the  desert  with  a  pantomime  of  the  Wise  Men,  the  roof 
of  the  Hur  palace  in  Jerusalem,  the  galley,  the  raft,  Simon- 


BEN   HUR  65 

ides'  house,  the  Grove  of  Daphne,  the  Fountain  of  Castalia, 
Ilderim's  tent,  the  Orchard  of  Palms,  the  gateway  to  the 
Circus,  the  arena,  the  vale  of  Hinnom,  and  Mount  Olivet.  A 
shaft  of  light  (25,000  candle  power)  was  used,  growing 
brighter  to  signify  Christ's  approach  and  dimmer  at  His  exit, 
Jesus  Himself  not  actually  being  impersonated. 

At  the  opening  performance  the  title  role  was  not  taken 
by  William  H.  Farnum  but  he  soon  stepped  into  it,  and  was 
later  regarded  as  having  been  the  most  successful  of  a  num- 
ber of  actors  in  the  part,  including  Conway  Tearle,  Henry 
Woodruff,  and  Thurston  Hall.  Messala  was  played  from  the 
start  by  William  S.  Hart  who  later  made  a  great  reputation 
in  grade  B  Western  movies.  One  of  the  last  interpretations 
of  Messala  was  given  by  Franklin  Pangborn  who  later  be- 
came a  slap-stick  two-reel  film  comedian,  specializing  in  out- 
raged floor-walker  impersonations. 

The  premiere  of  "Ben  Hur"  occurred  at  the  Broadway 
Theatre  in  New  York  City  on  November  29,  1899.  General 
Wallace  was  present,  conspicuously  seated  with  Mrs.  Wallace 
in  a  lower  proscenium  box,  and  made  a  brief  appearance 
before  the  footlights  between  the  acts.  The  performance  ran 
for  three  hours  and  twenty-nine  minutes,  which  is  interest- 
ing to  compare  with  the  running  time  of  the  current  film  of 
sixty  years  later  which  takes  three  hours  and  thirty-two 
minutes.  (The  silent  film  version  of  1925  ran  two  hours  and 
eight  minutes.) 

The  dramatic  version  was  an  immediate  and  smashing 
hit  in  New  York  in  1899.  It  held  the  stage  for  twenty-four 
weeks,  until  May  12th,  and  reopened  again  in  the  fall.  The 
more  serious  critics  found  much  fault,  just  as  the  earliest 
critics  of  the  novel  had  done,  but  everyone  went  to  see  the 
production.  The  New  York  Clipper  speaks  of  "packed 
houses,"  "a  triumphant  success,"  "record-breaking  attend- 
ance," and  "enormous  business." 

In  1900  the  big  heavy  show  set  out  on  the  first  of  many 
tours  to  the  leading  theatres  in  the  major  cities  of  the  United 
States,  annual  tours  which  were  to  continue  unbroken  until 
the  play  was  finally  withdrawn,  in  Newark,  New  Jersey,  in 
the  last  week  of  April,  1920.  There  were  Australian  tours 


66  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  London  productions.  Unfortunately  the  stage  version  of 
"Ben  Hur"  never  played  in  Santa  Fe,  nor  even  in  Albuquer- 
que, or  anywhere  in  New  Mexico.  One  of  the  first  of  the  tours 
took  the  show  to  Indianapolis,  which  was  in  a  sense  Wallace's 
"home  town,"  when  he  was  not  living  in  Crawfordsville. 

Fifty  years  ago  the  present  writer  had  the  pleasure  of 
seeing  "Ben  Hur"  performed  on  the  stage  of  the  Davidson 
Theatre  in  Milwaukee  during  the  1908-09  tour,  when  the 
good  English  actor,  Conway  Tearle,  had  the  title  role.  The 
boatswain  in  the  galley  scene  had  a  sort  of  gavel  with  which 
he  pounded  time  for  the  oarsmen,  and  he  ominously  began 
pounding  the  gavel  several  minutes  before  the  curtain  went 
up  on  the  scene.  The  gray  sheets  fluttering  to  represent  waves 
in  the  raft  scene  made  a  poor  illusion;  but  the  chariot  race 
was  an  undeniable  thriller ! 

For  some  reason,  Claude  Hagen's  panorama  of  the  arena 
was  dispensed  with,  and  the  horses,  chariots  and  charioteers 
performed  against  black  curtains  with  strong  spotlights 
thrown  onto  the  stage  from  the  wings.  There  were  only  two 
chariots,  with  two  horses  each.  The  horses  galloped  slowly 
forward,  facing  directly  into  the  footlights,  immediately  re- 
mindful of  the  horses  used  to  pull  the  smoking  fire  engines 
of  the  1900's.  The  rollers  of  the  two  treadmills  made  a  tre- 
mendous noise,  filling  the  darkened  auditorium  with  thunder 
enough  to  suggest  the  giving  way  of  a  gigantic  log  boom  on 
the  Columbia  River.  So  noisy  were  the  treadmills  that  the 
clatter  of  the  horses  hooves,  the  grinding  of  the  wheels  of 
the  chariots,  and  the  crack  of  Messala's  whip  were  quite  in- 
audible. After  a  few  moments,  Messala's  chariot  slipped  into 
a  slant,  and  the  audience  knew  that  the  villain's  chariot  had 
lost  its  wheel,  as  in  the  story.  Ben  Hur's  chariot  then  moved 
a  little  forward  on  its  treadmill,  and  the  curtain  came  down — 
amidst  wild  applause ! 

Joseph  Brooks,  the  Erlanger  representative  who  first 
contacted  Wallace  about  the  play,  was  killed  in  a  fall  from 
the  eighth  floor  of  his  home  on  West  79th  Street,  New  York, 
November  29, 1916  (the  anniversary  of  the  opening  in  1899) . 
He  was  believed  to  have  earned  a  fortune  of  $250,000  as 
director  of  "Ben  Hur." 


BEN   HUR  67 

Mr.  McKee,  in  his  biography  of  Wallace,  summarizes  the 
success  of  the  stage  version  for  us : 

It  was  destined  to  be  performed  6,000  times,  mostly  in  big  cities 
and  at  high  prices;  a  total  of  20,000,000  persons  were  to  pay 
$10,000,000  to  see  it.  The  itinerary  for  twenty-one  years — with 
enlarged  stages,  S.  R.  O.  signs,  full-length  seasons — is  un- 
equaled  in  the  history  of  the  theatre.  It  is  a  roll  call  of  Amer- 
ica, and  of  some  of  the  rest  of  the  world.  Ben-Hur  broke  down 
another  barrier:  as  the  novel  was  bought  by  people  who  had 
never  read  a  novel  before,  the  play  was  stormed  by  newcomers 
to  the  theatre. . . . 

Klaw  and  Erlanger  made  millions,  Harpers  and  the  Wallaces 
(father  and  son)  hundreds  of  thousands,  and  a  vast  throng  of 
actors,  managers,  stagehands,  book  sellers,  and  other  middle- 
men fattened  on  Ben-Hur. . . . 

General  Wallace  died  at  Crawfordsville,  Indiana,  on  Feb- 
ruary 14,  1905.  "Ben  Hur"  was  on  tour,  of  course,  and  that 
year  it  had  played  Indianapolis  once  again. 

Within  a  few  months  after  the  final  withdrawal  of  the 
play  in  1920,  preparations  were  under  way  for  the  first 
"colossal"  silent  movie  version.  The  General's  son,  Henry, 
was  paid  $1,000,000  for  the  rights  by  Erlanger,  Ziegfeld  and 
Dillingham ;  and  the  Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer  studio  outbid  all 
others  in  purchasing  the  rights.  The  studio  then  "labored  for 
three  years,  1922-1925,  from  Rome  to  Hollywood,  expending 
$4,000,000  more  on  (the  staging  from)  a  scenario  by  Carey 
Wilson  and  Bess  Meredyth."  Mr.  McKee's  biography 
continues : 

The  seafight  was  enacted  in  the  Mediterranean  with  fourteen 
vessels  and  twenty-eight  hundred  men.  Ten  thousand  actors, 
one  hundred  and  ninety-eight  horses,  a  specially  constructed 
grandstand  three  thousand  feet  long,  forty-two  cameras  (one 
of  them  in  an  airplane)  were  necessary  for  the  chariot  race, 
which  cost  a  quarter  of  a  million 

Variety,  the  well  known  theatrical  journal,  in  its  number 
for  November  18,  1959,  gives  us  some  further  little  known 
facts: 

While  a  good  part  of  the  picture  was  photographed  in  Italy, 
some  big  scenes  like  the  chariot  race  and  interiors  were  done 


68  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

in  Hollywood.  When  the  race  was  run,  a  wheel  came  loose  on  a 
chariot  and  several  of  the  vehicles  crashed  into  one  another. 
Through  a  miracle,  no  one  was  hurt,  but  one  of  the  most  spec- 
tacular (and  unplanned)  scenes  had  been  put  on  record. 
In  the  chapter  in  his  book,  "The  Lion's  Share,"  devoted  to 
"Ben-Hur,"  Bosley  Crowther  records  that  the  picture  when  it 
finally  opened  on  Broadway  on  December  30,  1925,  ran  128 
minutes  and  stayed  at  the  George  M.  Cohan  Theatre  for  a 
year.  In  fact,  it  didn't  get  into  general  release  until  the  fall  of 
1927.  According  to  Crowther,  "Ben-Hur"  lost  money  for  Metro, 
but  "the  vast  commercial  prestige  redounding  to  the  company 
through  having  this  picture  was  a  tremendous  .  .  .  boon." 
Total  earnings,  including  those  from  a  reissue  in  1931  with 
sound  dubbed  in,  totaled  $9,386,000  according  to  Crowther. 
With  35%  subtracted  for  distribution,  this  left  $6,100,000. 
However,  this  had  to  be  divided  equally  with  the  backers,  who 
included  Florenz  Ziegfeld,  Vincent  Astor,  Robert  Walton 
Goelet  and  others.  .  .  . 

We  conclude  our  references  to  the  first  of  the  great  "Ben 
Hur"  films  with  one  more  quotation  from  Mr.  McKee : 

The  movie's  first  run  on  Broadway  lasted  twenty-two  months, 
and  then  it  pervaded  the  country  and  much  of  the  world,  after 
the  manner  of  movies.  Berlin  applauded  it;  King  George  and 
Queen  Mary  attended  a  special  showing  at  Windsor  Castle; 
China  banned  it  as  pro-Christian  propaganda  ...  A  movie 
edition  of  the  novel  sold  enormously.  Whoever  had  not  seen 
Ben-Hur  before  saw  it  now,  in  cities,  towns,  hamlets. 

We  have  already  referred  to  the  Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer 
film  version  (Santa  Fe  saw  it  now,  of  course !)  which  had  its 
premiere  in  New  York  City  at  Loew's  State  Theatre  on  No- 
vember 16,  1959,  indicating  the  enormous  earnings  which 
are  anticipated.  And  we  have  already  mentioned  the  collabo- 
ration of  a  number  of  distinguished  playwrights  on  the 
adaptation.  It  is  undoubtedly  the  treatment  which  the  more 
intimate  scenes  of  the  story  have  been  given  by  these  exper- 
ienced authors  which  accounts  for  the  praise  which  the  film 
has  received  from  all  the  more  serious  movie  critics,  from 
Mr.  Crowther  in  the  New  York  Times  on  into  all  the  better 
national  magazines  which  carry  cinema  reviews.  For  the  first 


BEN   HUR  69 

time  since  1880  the  intimate  scenes  of  the  story  have  received 
general  critical  commendation. 

The  Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer  film  was  directed  by  William 
Wyler.  It  will  be  presented  twice  daily  to  a  reserved  seat 
audience  in  no  less  than  30  American  cities  by  March,  1960. 
Once  again  Santa  Fe  will  miss  a  presentation  of  the  story 
that  was  originally  written  in  part  in  the  Palace  of  the  Gov- 
ernors. This  is  ironic,  for  the  medium  used  should  make  for 
the  widest  dispersal  in  the  shortest  possible  time. 

We  conclude  with  a  paragraph  from  Variety  magazine 
for  Wednesday,  November  18,  1959: 

The  statistics  concerning  the  production  are  overwhelming. 
They  include  1,500,000  feet  of  exposed  film,  six  $100,000  "Cam- 
era 65"  units,  300  sets,  100,000  costumes,  1,500,000  props,  78 
trained  horses  from  Yugoslavia,  12  camels  from  North  Africa, 
hundreds  of  other  horses,  sheep  and  other  animals,  10,000  feet 
of  electrical  equipment,  25,000  extras  and  bit  players,  1,000 
Italian  workers  who  labored  one  year  to  build  the  arena  for  the 
chariot  race,  50  ships  built  especially  for  the  sea  battle,  18 
custom-made  chariots,  60,000  blossoms  for  a  victory  parade, 
two  miles  of  pipe  for  water  used  in  40  minutes,  one  ton  of 
specially  designed  ceramic  tile  .  .  . 

"My  God!"  exclaimed  General  Wallace  when  shown  all 
the  elaborate  scenery  being  placed  in  position  for  the  dress 
rehearsal  for  the  initial  New  York  production  of  "  Ben  Hur" 
in  1899 :  "Did  I  set  all  this  in  motion?" 


Hollywood,  April  5  (AP) — The  15  million  dollar  movie 
"Ben-Hur,"  most  costly  in  Hollywood  history,  reaped  11  Os- 
cars last  night.  It  was  the  greatest  Academy  Award  triumph 
ever  scored.  The  Albuquerque  Tribune,  April  5,  1960. 

(F.D.R.) 


Book  Reviews 

The  Mexican  Revolution:  19 14-19 15.  By  Robert  F.  Quirk. 
Bloomington :  University  of  Indiana  Press,  1960.  Pp.  325, 
index.  $6.75. 

Here  is  an  account  of  a  most  critical  year  in  the  history 
of  Mexico,  from  the  time  of  the  collapse  of  the  regime  of  Vic- 
toriano  Huerta  in  mid-1914  to  the  triumph  of  the  Constitu- 
tionalist forces  of  Venustiano  Carranza  and  Alvaro  Obregon 
over  the  Conventionist  forces  of  Pancho  Villa  and  Emiliano 
Zapata  in  mid-1915.  It  was  a  most  significant  year,  one  in 
which  the  Mexican  nation  was  caught  up  in  a  titanic  struggle 
between  competing  revolutionary  personalities  and  ideolo- 
gies. There  was  a  plethora  of  parliamentary  debate  and  revo- 
lutionary proclamation  but  the  outcome  was  determined,  of 
course,  on  the  field  of  battle. 

Professor  Robert  Quirk  has  made  a  substantial  contribu- 
tion to  our  knowledge  of  the  great  revolution  in  Mexico.  This 
book  is  solidly  based  upon  primary  material.  It  is  a  product 
of  prolonged  research  in  depth.  The  style  is  lively,  witty,  and 
lucid. 

For  the  first  time,  in  English,  we  have  a  truly  penetrating 
analysis  of  the  regional,  ideological,  and  personality  clashes 
that  provoked  such  turmoil  in  this  year.  In  addition  to  bring- 
ing into  sharper  relief  the  Villa-Carranza  feud,  the  author 
explores  in  detail  the  more  subtle  differences  within  each 
major  camp,  such  as  factors  which  prevented  full  cooperation 
between  Villa  and  Zapata  and  the  often  unpredictable  nature 
of  Obregon's  relationship  with  Carranza.  In  addition,  there  is 
brought  to  light  the  important  supporting  roles  played  by 
such  Constitutionalist  generals  as  Lucio  Blanco,  Francisco 
Coss,  Pablo  Gonzalez,  Eulalio  Gonzalez,  and  villista  officers 
as  Felipe  Angeles  and  Roque  Gonzalez  Garza.  Most  vivid  of 
all  are  his  descriptions  of  Zapatistas  like  Antonio  Diaz  Soto 
y  Gama,  Manuel  Palafox  and  Antonio  Barona. 

If  the  author  is  partial  to  one  side  or  the  other  he  cer- 
tainly conceals  it  well  in  his  exposition.  The  only  slightly 
subjective  treatment  of  an  individual  that  this  reviewer  can 

70 


BOOK  REVIEWS  71 

detect  is  that  of  Gonzalez  Garza.  Perhaps  this  is  because  the 
author  drew  quite  heavily  on  his  private  papers  and  was  in 
such  close  contact  with  him  prior  to  writing  this  book. 

To  the  mountain  of  criticism  already  heaped  upon  Wood- 
row  Wilson's  diplomacy  in  this  period,  Mr.  Quirk  piles  on 
still  more.  In  particular,  he  portrays  the  near  idiocy  of  a 
policy  of  backing  a  leader  such  as  Villa,  even  after  his  cause 
was  hopelessly  lost. 

In  sum,  this  volume  fills  a  real  gap,  but  it  makes  even  more 
apparent  another  gap  in  the  early  history  of  the  revolution. 
The  books  by  Stanley  Ross  and  Charles  Cumberland  have 
dealt  competently  with  the  Madero  Period  1910-February 
1913.  What  is  badly  needed  now  to  fill  the  remaining  gap  is  a 
treatment,  as  fine  as  this  book  of  Mr.  Quirk's  on  the  mid-1914- 
1915  period,  of  the  Huerta  regime  during  the  period  Febru- 
ary 1913-July  1914. 

University  of  New  Mexico  EDWIN  LIEUWEN 


Texas  Indian  Papers  1825-1843.  Edited  by  Dorman  H.  Win- 
frey et  al.  Austin :  Texas  State  Library,  1959.  Pp.  298. 
$5.25. 

The  Texas  archives  are  an  invaluable  source  of  informa- 
tion for  students  of  both  state  and  national  affairs.  The  In- 
dian papers  are  now  made  more  readily  available  to  them. 
Subsequent  volumes  will  present  additional  documents  for 
the  period  from  1844  to  annexation  and  into  the  statehood 
period. 

The  story  of  the  red  man  in  the  United  States  has  been 
explained  in  scholarly  publications,  in  others  of  a  trivial  na- 
ture, in  drama,  music  and  the  novel.  For  sheer  understand- 
ing of  a  most  complex  story,  if  attainable,  documents  offer 
for  the  interested  mind  the  most  promising  avenue  toward 
achieving  it.  They  deal  with  war  and  peace,  trade  and  friend- 
ship, the  way  of  life  for  Indian  and  white  in  bygone  days,  and 
sidelights  on  human  behavior  that  reveal  at  least  one  con- 
stant in  an  ever  changing  world.  It  is  unfortunate  for  history 
that  Indians  did  not  record  their  thoughts  more  often,  so  we 


72  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

must  picture  them  through  the  white  man's  words  and  docu- 
ments offer  the  only  front  row  seat  for  the  viewer. 

The  Texas  State  Archive  staff  transcribed  the  documents 
literally  and  without  omissions.  They  are  to  be  congratulated. 
Despite  maximum  care,  one  wonders  whether  an  error  did 
creep  into  the  text  on  line  1,  page  3  and  line  19. 

Notes  on  General  Ashley  the  Overland  Trail  and  South  Pass. 
By  Donald  McKay  Frost.  Barre,  Massachusetts:  Barre 
Gazette,  1960.  Pp.  xii,  149.  Index  and  pocket  map.  $5.00. 

This  publication  is  a  reprint  from  the  Proceedings  of  The 
American  Antiquarian  Society.  Chapter  1  presents  a  brief 
sketch  of  the  Rocky  Mountain  fur  trade,  and  chapters  2-8 
deal  with  activities  of  General  Ashley.  Building  on  Hiram 
Chittenden's  pioneer  work,  the  author  uses  the  letters  of 
Daniel  T.  Potts,  published  in  Appendix  A,  the  narrative  of 
James  Clyman,  the  journal  of  Jedediah  Smith,  and  newspa- 
per accounts  (Appendix  B)  for  the  years  1822-1830.  The 
excellent  discussion  of  the  fur  trade  and  the  printing  of 
source  material  in  the  Appendix  (nearly  two-thirds  of  the 
book)  make  this  study  of  prime  interest  to  students  of  west- 
ern history. 

Forty  Years  Among  the  Indians:  A  true  yet  thrilling  narra- 
tive of  the  Author's  experiences  among  the  Natives.  By 
Daniel  W.  Jones.  Los  Angeles :  Westernlore  Press,  1960. 
Pp.  xvi,  378.  $8.50. 

Dan  Jones  was  a  rolling  stone,  but  a  rolling  stone  bent  on 
business.  He  participated  in  the  founding  of  Utah  by  the  Mor- 
mons, preached  their  Gospel  in  Mexico  and  worked  among 
the  Indians  in  the  Salt  River  valley  of  Arizona  with  both  reli- 
gious and  economic  aims.  His  long  rambling  history  was 
written  late  in  life  and  allowance  must  be  made  for  an  occa- 
sional lapse  of  memory,  not  to  mention  inaccuracy  of  infor- 
mation. The  original  publication  has  long  been  a  collector's 
item,  so  this  reprint  will  be  welcome  to  readers  interested  in 
westernlore. 


BOOK  REVIEWS  73 

Sibley's  New  Mexico  Campaign.  By  Martin  Hardwick  Hall. 
Austin :  University  of  Texas  Press,  1960.  Pp.  xv,  366.  Il- 
lustrations, bibliography  and  index. 

This  is  the  most  intensive  treatment  of  the  Confederate 
invasion  of  New  Mexico  during  the  Civil  War  that  has  yet 
been  published,  but  it  is  not  the  definitive  account.  The  bibli- 
ography is  good,  but  a  few  more  items  of  information  cover- 
ing moot  points  might  have  been  unearthed  if  other  Federal 
archives  relating  to  New  Mexico  had  been  consulted.  The 
author  did  not  find  a  satisfactory  answer  to  the  question  why 
the  Federal  troops  stationed  at  Fort  Fillmore  failed  to  make 
the  march  to  San  Agustin  springs  as  a  fighting  force.  The 
answer  has  been  offered  by  other  writers  that  the  troops  had 
filled  their  canteens  with  whiskey  rather  than  water  and 
thirst  caused  their  defeat.  Soldiers  have  marched  long  dis- 
tances under  trying  circumstances,  so  it  is  reasonable  to  as- 
sume that  the  above  march  need  not  have  ended  so  disas- 
trously. Nor  does  the  author  explain  satisfactorily  the  reason 
for  Chivington's  march  over  the  mountain  to  attack  the  Con- 
federate supply  train.  Was  it  so  planned  or  was  there  another 
reason  or  reasons? 

There  is  an  occasional  minor  point  that  might  be  ques- 
tioned, but  it  is  not  essential  to  do  so.  The  book  is  well  written 
and  a  useful  addition  to  southwestern  historical  literature. 
The  author  has  included  the  muster  rolls  of  the  confederate 
troops  that  fill  over  a  fourth  of  the  total  pages. 

It  has  long  been  acceptable  practice  to  drop  the  accent 
on  Rio  and  Santa  Fe. 


Narrative  of  the  Surrender  Of  a  Command  of  U.S.  Forces  At 
Fort  Fillmore  New  Mexico  In  July,  A.D.,  1861.  By  Major 
James  Cooper  McKee.  Houston :  Stagecoach  Press,  1960. 
Pp.  viii,  64.  Maps  and  index.  $4.75. 

"One  of  the  rarest  Civil  War  items  of  Texas-New  Mexico 
action,  now  reprinted  with  added  Confederate  reports,"  so 
reads,  and  correctly,  the  jacket  blurb.  Major  McKee,  army 
surgeon,  left  for  posterity  this  account  of  the  surrender  of 


74  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Fort  Fillmore  which  historians  are  still  belaboring  in  search 
of  the  truth.  The  limited  edition  of  550  copies  of  the  reprint 
is  a  credit  in  appearance  to  the  Press:  "Type  used  for  the 
text  is  Excelsior,  composed  on  the  Linotype,  with  handset 
accessories.  The  paper  is  Hamilton's  Kilmory." 

A  Guide  to  the  Microfilm  of  Papers  relating  to  New  Mexico 
Land  Grants.  By  Albert  James  Diaz.  Albuquerque :  Uni- 
versity of  New  Mexico  Press,  1960.  Pp.  vii,  102.  $1.75. 

This  is  a  guide  to  the  original  records  of  the  Federal  Land 
Office,  Santa  Fe,  New  Mexico,  and  the  microfilm  copy  at  the 
University  of  New  Mexico  and  other  libraries.  It  provides  a 
brief  description  of  each  of  the  twenty-three  archival  sec- 
tions. The  land  grant  cases  are  then  listed  by  title  in  alpha- 
betical order,  listed  by  report  number,  by  file  number  and 
case,  and  finally  by  microfilm  reel  number.  The  Archives  are 
important  for  southwestern  history  and  allied  subjects,  and 
the  guide  should  encourage  scholarly  exploitation  of  their 
wealth. 

F.  D.  R. 

The  Cahuilla  Indians.  By  Harry  C.  James.  Los  Angeles: 
Westernlore  Press,  1960.  Pp.  185.  $7.50. 

Historians  and  writers  in  general  have  long  been  guilty 
of  ignoring  the  Indians  of  California — or  writing  them  off  as 
stupid,  backward  savages.  All  one  has  to  do  to  realize  the 
truth  of  this  is  to  examine  the  major  works  dealing  with  Cali- 
fornia history  or  with  phases  of  that  history  and  one  will 
notice  the  absence  of  material  on  the  native  Californian. 
When  he  is  mentioned  it  is  almost  always  with  the  same  atti- 
tude as  was  held  by  the  Spanish  and  Anglo-American  invad- 
ers of  the  Far  West :  the  California  Indians  are  fit  only  to  be 
conquered  and  "civilized." 

It  is  very  refreshing  indeed  to  find  a  work  of  the  quality 
of  The  Cahuilla  Indians,  written  well  and  written,  I  think, 
accurately.  Harry  C.  James  has  known  the  Cahuilla  for  many 
years ;  in  fact  he  has  come  to  be  a  part  of  this  outstanding 
group  of  Indians.  Thus  he  has  had  many  first-person  contacts 


BOOK  REVIEWS  75 

which  enrich  his  narrative  and  make  the  book  one  which 
should  be  on  the  shelf  of  every  southwestern  historian  and 
armchair  anthropologist.  In  particular,  his  accounts  of  Ca- 
huilla  folklore  and  of  leading  Indians  such  as  Ramona,  Juan 
Antonio,  and  Fig  Tree  John,  are  very  interesting  and  in- 
formative. The  Cahuilla  creation  story  is  a  very  beautiful 
one,  certainly  ranking  in  poetic  imagery  with  the  best  of 
mankind's  creation  myths. 

Most  writers  who  deal  with  the  Indian  write  from  the 
"outside"  so  to  speak;  they  cannot  give  to  the  reader  the 
"feel"  of  the  particular  Indian  culture  which  they  are  de- 
scribing. Mr.  James  overcomes  this  difficulty  to  a  great  ex- 
tent— one  comes  away  from  his  book  with  a  feeling  of  having 
been  direct  contact  with  the  Cahuilla. 

Technically  speaking,  The  Cahuilla  Indians  is  not  a  his- 
tory, although  it  does  bring  to  light  some  aspects  of  the  In- 
dian past.  It  is  more  than  anything  else  an  introduction  to  a 
people,  in  this  case,  the  Cahuilla.  The  author  seeks  to  have 
the  reader  understand  something  of  the  Indians'  way  of  life, 
of  their  importance  in  history,  of  their  folk  imagery,  of 
their  adjustment  to  the  European  invasion,  and  of  their 
promise  for  the  future.  General  readers  will  appreciate  Mr. 
James'  careful  location  of  Cahuilla  village-sites  and  his  dis- 
cussion of  the  differences  between  the  Western,  Mountain 
and  Desert  Cahuilla  subdivisions.  His  story  of  the  back- 
grounds for  Helen  Hunt  Jackson's  novel  Ramona  is  very  in- 
teresting as  well. 

The  Cahuilla  Indians  is  a  small  but  beautifully  prepared 
book.  It  is  undoubtedly  one  of  the  nicest  volumes  published 
by  Westernlore  Press,  partly  because  of  the  excellent  art 
work  of  Don  Louis  Perceval.  The  illustrations  are  either  tak- 
en from  Cahuilla  motifs  or  are  depictions  of  the  Indians'  way 
of  life.  The  book  is  also  enhanced  by  over  two  dozen  fine 
photographs,  including  a  picture  of  the  real  Ramona. 

The  publisher  indicates  that  The  Cahuilla  Indians  "...  is 
certain  to  remain  the  definitive  work  . . ."  on  this  tribe.  I  hope 
that  this  will  not  be  true,  for  even  though  Mr.  James'  book 
is  excellent  indeed,  it  does  not  tell  the  complete  story  of  the 
Cahuilla  in  either  historical  or  anthropological  dimensions. 


76  NEW  MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

It  is  to  be  hoped  that  one  day  a  trained  historian  will  consult 
the  Spanish,  Mexican  and  Anglo-American  manuscript  ma- 
terial and  will  re-create  in  detail  the  exciting  past  of  this  im- 
portant tribe.  Until  then,  and  even  after  that  event,  Harry 
C.  James'  work  will  remain  one  of  the  best  introductions  to 
an  Indian  group  that  has  been  written. 

San  Fernando  Valley  State  College  JACK  D.  FORBES 


Our  Spanish  Southwest.  By  Lynn  I.  Perrigo.  Dallas :  Banks 
Upshaw  and  Company,  1960.  Bibliography.  Index.  Pp.  iv, 
498. 

Our  Spanish  Southwest  is  designed  as  a  textbook  and  gen- 
eral reference  work  on  southwest  history.  It  is  a  formidable 
undertaking  for  its  498  pages.  There  is  a  set  of  good  maps 
depicting  Indian  cultures,  Spanish  and  foreign  explorers, 
developing  transportation  and  communication  facilities,  and 
national  parks  and  monuments.  The  work  is  enhanced  by 
sixty-nine  pages  of  bibliography  and  an  adequate  index.  Dr. 
Perrigo  has  successfully  attempted  to  fill  the  urgent  need  for 
a  text  in  southwest  and  borderlands  history  with  this  publi- 
cation. Until  a  more  detailed  synthesis  appears  the  present 
work  will  certainly  be  used. 

A  survey  of  such  a  vast  area  as  Texas,  New  Mexico,  Ari- 
zona, California  and  environs  from  prehistoric  times  to  the 
present  is  bound  to  have  some  shortcomings.  Those  interested 
in  colonial  times  will  be  disappointed  with  the  scan  one  hun- 
dred and  twenty  pages  devoted  to  the  time  area  to  1821.  The 
colonial  section  suffers  from  compressing  too  much  data  into 
too  few  pages.  There  are  a  number  of  factual  errors,  nebu- 
lous definitions  of  Spanish  terms,  and  frequent  typographical 
errors.  The  nineteenth  and  twentieth  centuries  are  empha- 
sized, and  as  a  consequence,  fare  much  better,  even  though 
the  style  often  fails  to  present  the  information  in  the  most 
interesting  light.  The  reader  interested  in  Indian  affairs 
would  wish  for  a  deeper  treatment  and  one  expanded  beyond 
the  Navaho  and  their  problems. 

Many  of  the  errors  in  print  are  obviously  the  fault  of  the 


BOOK  REVIEWS  77 

editor  and  his  proofreaders.  Pages  47,  22,  28,  and  the  Bibli- 
ography are  cases  in  point. 

Mexico  City  College  RICHARD  E.  GREENLEAF 

Fremont's  Fourth  Expedition.  Edited  by  LeRoy  R.  Hafen 
and  Ann  W.  Hafen,  Glendale,  California :  The  Arthur  H. 
Clark  Company,  1960.  Pp.  319.  Illustrations,  maps,  and 
index. 

John  Charles  Fremont  is  one  of  the  most  controversial 
figures  associated  with  the  pioneer  history  of  the  American 
West,  as  this  collection  of  documents  once  again  verifies.  Be- 
tween 1842  and  1846  he  conducted  three  highly  successful 
and  well-publicized  topographical  expeditions  through  the 
Rocky  Mountains  and  along  the  Pacific  Coast.  Then  his  career 
seemed  to  fall  apart.  The  historic  feud  with  General  Kearny 
during  the  conquest  of  California  forced  the  once  glamorous 
pathfinder  to  "resign"  from  the  army.  Backed  by  his  power- 
ful father-in-law,  Senator  Thomas  Hart  Benton,  and  ample 
private  funds,  he  set  out  from  St.  Louis  in  the  fall  of  1848 
determined  to  find  a  practical  railroad  route  to  the  Pacific 
along  the  thirty-eighth  parallel. 

The  expedition  consisted  of  thirty-three  men,  most  of 
whom  were  veterans  of  Fremont's  earlier  ventures.  In  addi- 
tion, there  were  one  hundred  and  thirty  mules,  and  the  best 
equipment,  instruments,  and  arms  that  money  could  buy.  Old 
Bill  Williams,  the  famous  mountain  man,  served  as  official 
guide.  Fremont  subsequently  attempted  to  cross  the  Sangre 
de  Cristo  and  San  Juan  Mountains  during  one  of  the  most 
severe  winters  on  record,  perhaps  as  much  to  remove  the 
stigma  of  his  recent  court-martial  as  to  prove  the  feasibility 
of  a  railroad  route  across  the  Central  Rockies. 

But  the  fourth  expedition  proved  a  resounding  failure, 
and  for  that  reason  it  is  less  well-known  than  the  previous 
ones.  The  Fremont  party  got  lost  in  the  mountains  and  before 
it  could  extricate  itself,  ten  men  and  all  the  mules  were  dead. 
In  the  resulting  controversy,  various  participants  and  inter- 
ested parties  tried  to  fix  the  blame  on  someone  other  than 
themselves.  Fremont  claimed  that  his  guide  was  incompetent 


78  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  that  his  men  were  cowardly  and  easily  discouraged  by 
misfortune — charges  not  supported  by  evidence. 

In  1955  William  Brandon  published  an  excellent  narrative 
of  Fremont's  ill-fated  expedition  (THE  MEN  AND  THE 
MOUNTAIN)  based  largely  upon  original  documents  relat- 
ing to  the  episode.  He  fixed  most  of  the  blame  upon  the  leader 
himself,  plus  a  combination  of  severe  weather  and  just  plain 
bad  luck.  The  documents  used  by  Brandon,  with  additional 
miscellaneous  newspaper  stories,  letters,  and  reports,  have 
now  been  brought  together  by  one  of  the  most  careful  docu- 
mentarians  of  Rocky  Mountain  history. 

Professor  Hafen  has  the  good  judgment  not  to  clutter  the 
various  accounts  of  the  expedition  with  too  many  footnotes. 
By  bringing  all  of  the  available  primary  materials  together, 
he  has  made  a  contribution  to  a  very  important  facet  of  west- 
ern explorations.  The  reader  will  not  only  be  gripped  by  the 
stark  drama  that  unfolds,  though  some  of  the  narratives  are 
repetitious,  he  also  will  have  the  opportunity  to  draw  his  own 
conclusions  as  to  direct  responsibility  for  the  tragedy. 

University  of  Oklahoma  W.  EUGENE  HOLLON 

The  Life  of  John  Wesley  Hardin  as  Written  by  Himself.  In- 
troduction by  Robert  G.  McCubbin.  Norman :  University 
of  Oklahoma  Press,  1961.  Pp.  xxi,  152.  $2.00. 

Originally  published  in  Seguin,  Texas,  in  1896,  a  year 
after  Hardin's  death  at  the  hands  of  John  Selman,  in  El  Paso, 
Texas,  the  book  now  republished  has  long  since  been  a  scarce 
and  expensive  item,  eagerly  sought  after  by  rare  book  dealers 
and  collectors.  Assuming  that  he  told  the  truth  in  his  book, 
John  Wesley  Hardin  killed  many  men,  some  with  no  justifi- 
cation whatever,  others  under  circumstances  which  might 
have  cause  a  lenient  jury,  in  a  favorable  atmosphere,  to  bring 
in  a  verdict  that  he  either  killed  in  self  defense  or  under  suffi- 
cient provocation.  Born  in  Fannin  County,  Texas,  in  1853, 
reared  in  the  backwash  of  the  Civil  War  years,  Hardin  was 
peculiar  as  boy  and  man,  even  in  an  era  when  much  was 
accepted,  tolerated  and  forgiven  in  a  frontier  country.  Ac- 
cording to  his  own  story,  Hardin  was  a  wayward  boy,  a  head- 


BOOK  REVIEWS  79 

strong,  unruly  young  man,  a  gambler  and  hard  drinker  as  an 
adult,  fond  of  owning  and  racing  horses  for  high  stakes,  de- 
termined to  have  his  own  way  in  everything,  regardless  of 
the  results  to  parents,  wife,  children,  or  society  in  general. 
Belatedly  for  his  own  good,  Hardin  wound  up  in  the  peni- 
tentiary at  Huntsville  and  was  confined  there,  still  unruly 
and  unrepentent,  for  many  years,  being  finally  pardoned. 
Apparently  Hardin  never  suffered  remorse  as  the  result  of 
any  killing  for  which  he  was  responsible.  He  appears  to  have 
been  obsessed  with  the  idea  that  he  was  always  right,  the 
other  fellow  to  the  encounter  always  wrong.  Throughout  the 
book  it  is  made  to  appear  that  he  nearly  always  emerged  the 
victor  in  any  fight,  the  hero  of  almost  every  incident.  Conse- 
quently the  book  has  a  decided  Walter  Mitty  flavor.  Hardin 
grew  up  in  a  period  when  thousands  of  fellow  Texans,  with 
much  less  to  go  on  in  the  way  of  education  and  opportunity, 
became  respected,  successful  citizens.  Hardin's  attempt  to 
justify  his  wayward  conduct  does  not  seem  to  measure  up. 
No  doubt  a  "kill  or  be  killed"  character,  it  is  difficult  to  find  a 
category  for  him  in  the  southwestern  album.  Apparently  he 
had  no  nerves  and  was  a  man  of  great  physical  strength  and 
endurance.  Was  he  a  brave,  courageous  man?  Reckless,  dar- 
ing, a  swashbuckler,  yes.  Brave,  chivalrous,  no.  In  1927,  the 
McMillan  Company,  New  York,  published  a  reprint  of  the 
1882  Pat  F.  Garrett's  Authentic  Life  of  Billy  the  Kid,  with 
a  foreword  and  extensive  editorial  notes  by  the  late  Maurice 
Garland  Fulton,  of  Roswell,  New  Mexico.  It  is  to  be  regretted 
that  the  Oklahoma  U.  Press  and  Mr.  McCubbin  did  not  col- 
laborate in  a  like  project.  Inquiry  at  the  Huntsville,  Texas, 
penitentiary,  where  Hardin  was  confined  for  many  years, 
might  have  yielded  much  record  information,  which  in  turn 
would  have  indicated  worth  while  avenues  of  research,  result- 
ing in  a  harvest  of  interesting  explanatory  notes.  Notwith- 
standing this  lack,  the  Hardin  book  is  a  very  worth  while 
contribution,  one  that  will  be  welcomed  by  a  host  of  readers 
and  collectors.  Bob  McCubbin  and  the  publisher  deserve  the 
gratitude  of  all  lovers  of  Southwestern  history  for  their  en- 
terprise in  publishing  a  valuable  book  at  a  reasonable  price. 

Albuquerque  WILLIAM  A.  KELEHER 


Notes  and  Documents 


A  PAT  GARRBTT  ITEM 

In  The  Authentic  Life  of  Billy  the  Kid,  Garrett  devotes  a  single 
paragraph  to  his  meeting  with  Mariano  Leiva.  According  to  his  version, 
Juanito  Maes  approached  Garrett  at  Puerto  de  Luna  and  offered  to 
surrender,  but  was  told  the  posse  held  no  warrant  for  him.  As  he 
walked  away  Leiva  directed  a  tirade  of  abuse  at  Garrett,  saying  that 
he  would  like  to  see  any  damned  gringo  arrest  him.  When  his  actions 
became  threatening,  Garrett  slapped  him  off  the  porch.  Leiva  drew  his 
gun  and  fired  a  wild  shot,  whereupon  Garrett  shot  him  in  the  shoulder. 
The  desperado  then  fled.1  This  is  a  good  story  in  itself,  but  surely  a 
recountre  with  the  man  described  by  Sheriff  Perfecto  Armijo,  of  Ber- 
nalillo  County,  as  "without  doubt  the  worst  villain  within  the  bounds 
of  the  Territory"2  deserves  something  more  than  passing  mention. 

Properly  viewed,  Garrett's  account  takes  its  place  as  one  of  three 
apparently  unrelated  incidents.  The  first  of  these  was  the  disappearance 
of  Colonel  Charles  S.  Potter,  a  member  of  the  U.  S.  Geological  Survey 
Corps.  On  October  14, 1880,  he  left  Tijeras  en  route  to  the  New  Placers 
— and  vanished.  By  the  end  of  the  year  his  friends  had  become  so  con- 
cerned about  his  fate  that  they  offered  a  reward  of  $1,000  for  discovery 
of  his  whereabouts  if  alive  and  $200  for  the  recovery  of  his  body  if  dead, 
but  no  claimant  of  the  money  appeared. 

The  second  occurred  on  December  10,  1880,  when  Garrett  and  his 
posse  rode  into  Puerto  de  Luna  to  deliver  two  prisoners,  John  J.  Webb 
and  George  Davis,  to  the  deputies  there.  While  the  officer  was  sitting  in 
a  store  operated  by  Alexander  Grezelachowski,  Juan  Silva  (erroneously 
called  Juanito  Maes  in  The  Authentic  Life)  walked  up  and  offered  to 
surrender.  The  balance  of  Garrett's  account  is  in  accord  with  the  re- 
ports in  the  contemporary  papers3  and  need  not  be  repeated. 

The  third  took  place  at  Bernalillo  a  few  days  later,  when  officers 
there  captured  two  horse  thieves:  Pantaleon  Miera,  a  quondam  lieu- 
tenant of  the  infamous  Sostenes  Archeveque,  and  Santos  Benavides. 
Presumably  the  town  lacked  proper  jail  facilities,  since  the  prisoners 
were  confined  in  the  home  of  Constable  Pedro  Valdez.  Early  in  the 
evening  of  the  29th  the  guards  were  overpowered  and  the  two  thieves 
were  lynched  from  a  limb  of  a  cottonwood  which  stood  in  the  front  yard.4 

The  clue  that  was  to  bring  these  three  apparently  separate  and 
unrelated  incidents  into  focus  as  a  single  picture  was  the  fact  that 
Miera  had  pawned  a  gold  watch  and  chain.  When  they  were  recognized 
as  having  belonged  to  Colonel  Potter,  Sheriff  Armijo  proceeded  to  Ber- 

1.  Garrett,  Pat  F.,  The  Authentic  Life  of  Bitty  the  Kid.  Norman:   University  of 
Oklahoma  Press.  1954,  pp.  107-108. 

2.  Las  Vegas  Daily  Optic,  April  5,  1882. 

8.  Santa  Fe  Weekly  New  Mexican,  December  20,  1880. 
4.  Santa  Fe  Daily  New  Mexican,  December  30,  1880. 

80 


NOTES  81 

nalillo  to  trace  the  connection  between  the  two  men.  His  investigation 
cast  suspicion  upon  one  Escolastica  Perea,  who  was  promptly  arrested  in 
Isleta. 

Brought  to  Albuquerque  for  interrogation,  Perea  promptly  con- 
fessed that  he  had  seen  the  crime  committed,  although  he  denied  taking 
any  part  in  it.  According  to  his  story,  Colonel  Potter  had  met  some  men 
on  the  road  and  they  had  advised  him  to  proceed  to  the  New  Placers  via 
a  short  cut  which  passed  through  Tijeras  Canyon.  Miguel  Barrera 
accompanied  him  as  a  guide.  Mariano  Leiva  hastened  to  the  home  of 
one  California  Joe,  obtained  arms,  returned  to  the  party,  and  shot  Pot- 
ter. After  rifling  his  pockets  they  buried  the  body  in  the  bed  of  a  little 
stream  about  three  miles  from  Tijeras.  Officers  promptly  seized  Barrera 
at  Tejon  and  California  Joe  at  Maders,  and  lodged  them  in  jail  at  Albu- 
querque. On  the  night  of  January  31,  1881,  a  party  estimated  to  con- 
sist of  200  men  quietly  entered  the  jail,  seized  the  prisoners,  and  hung 
them  from  a  wooden  beam  in  front  of  the  building.5 

It  was  rumored  that  Leiva  (Leiba,  Leyba)  was  dead,  which  pre- 
sumably was  based  on  his  having  been  shot  by  Garrett.  However,  it  was 
eventually  learned  that  he  was  hiding  in  the  vicinity  of  Puerto  de  Luna. 
Officers  traced  him  from  there  to  White  Oaks,  then  to  Vallegos,  and 
thence  to  Truchas.  Each  time  the  hunted  man  managed  to  steal  fresh 
horses  and  make  his  escape.  On  the  15th  of  March  the  posse  lost  his 
trail  in  the  vicinity  of  Rincon  del  Alamo  Gordo.  While  they  searched 
for  it,  G.  M.  Wilson  stumbled  over  Leiva  himself.  The  fugitive  promptly 
fired,  but  a  cartridge  exploded  in  his  Winchester,  rendering  it  useless. 
An  instant  later  he  was  shot  in  the  left  arm.  He  was  taken  to  Las  Vegas 
by  way  of  Puerto  de  Luna  and  Anton  Chico,  speaking  very  little  on 
the  way  except  to  positively  deny  that  he  had  murdered  Colonel  Potter, 
even  after  he  was  reminded  that  he  had  boasted  to  some  sheepherders 
of  having  committed  the  crime.6 

Leiva  was  tried  on  August  18  on  the  charge  of  assault  with  intent 
to  kill  Garrett,  found  guilty,  and  fined  $80.00.7  While  this  may  hardly 
seem  sufficient  by  our  standards,  at  least  it  represents  some  improve- 
ment over  the  $2.50  fine  which  had  been  assessed  against  William  Smith 
for  the  attempted  murder  of  one  Waldo8— or  perhaps  it  simply  means 
that  attempting  to  kill  an  officer  of  the  law  was  regarded  as  a  much 
more  serious  crime  than  was  attempting  to  murder  an  ordinary  citizen. 
At  this  point  a  difficulty  arose.  Leiva's  presence  was  greatly  desired  at 
Albuquerque,  where,  said  the  Daily  Optic,  "a  grand  banquet  of  hemp 
awaits  him."9  Unfortunately,  the  stranglers  had  done  their  work  all 


5.  Ibid.,  January  30,  February  1,  February  2,  February  4,  1881. 

6.  Las  Vegas  Daily  Optic,  March  18,  1881. 

7.  Ibid.,  August  19,  1881. 

8.  Henry  Carroll  to  Post  Adjutant,  Fort  Stanton,  February  2,  1879.  Records  of  the 
War  Department,  Office  of  the  Adjutant  General,   1405  AGO   1878 ;   Consolidated   File 
Relating  to  the  Lincoln  County  War,  New  Mexico.  National  Archives. 

9.  Las  Vegas  Daily  Optic,  August  18,  1881. 


82  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

too  well.  With  the  witnesses  to  Potter's  murder  dead  and  buried,  no 
one  was  left  to  testify  against  Leiva.  However,  he  was  still  vulnerable 
on  a  charge  of  stealing  stock,  a  much  more  serious  matter  than  was  an 
attempt  to  murder  a  sheriff.  Found  guilty  as  charged,  he  was  sentenced 
to  seven  years  and  started  for  Leavenworth,  Kansas,  on  April  5,  1882, 
to  serve  his  sentence.10 

Note:  The  writer  is  indebted  to  Warden  Harold  A.  Cox,  Peniten- 
tiary of  New  Mexico,  for  assistance  in  gathering  data  on  Leiva's  career. 

Philip  J.  Rasch 

A  NEW  ENGLANDER  IN  NEW  MEXICO 

Among  the  countless  easterners  who  went  West  in  the  mid-nineteenth 
century  there  were  several  members  of  the  prominent  Wolcott  family  of 
New  England.  This  illustrious  family  has  included  three  governors  of 
Connecticut,  one  governor  of  Massachusetts,  a  signer  of  the  Declaration 
of  Independence,  and  an  impressive  list  of  cabinet  officials,  members  of 
Congress,  generals  and  judges.  The  earliest  man  to  bear  the  name  in 
America  was  Henry  Wolcott,  who  settled  first  in  Dorchester,  Massa- 
chusetts in  1630,  but  soon  moved  to  Windsor,  Connecticut.  After  two 
centuries  of  residence  in  New  England  at  least  one  branch  of  the  Wol- 
cotts  went  West.  One  of  them  was  the  author  of  the  interesting  letter 
that  follows. 

In  1859  Reverend  Samuel  Wolcott,  a  Congregational  minister  from 
Yale  College,  moved  his  family  from  Longmeadow,  Mass.,  to  Chicago, 
Illinois,  and  in  1862  to  Cleveland,  Ohio.  Several  of  the  sons  in  the  family 
sought  more  adventure  and  moved  still  further  on.  The  most  prominent 
member  of  this  generation  was  Edward  Oliver  Wolcott,  a  railroad 
lawyer  and  powerful  Republican  politician  in  Colorado.  He  served  as 
United  States  Senator  from  Colorado  1899  to  1901.  Amongst  some  mis- 
cellaneous papers  of  Senator  Wolcott,  recently  acquired  by  the  author, 
there  is  a  letter  written  by  his  eldest  brother  Samuel.  The  latter,  who 
has  no  particular  claim  to  historical  remembrance,  made  a  trip  through 
New  Mexico  in  1879  and  wrote  at  least  one  letter  describing  his  expe- 
riences. This  letter  to  an  unidentified  "Clara" — perhaps  a  relative, 
friend  or  sweetheart — gives  a  few  interesting  sidelights  on  conditions 
in  New  Mexico,  especially  on  Indian  life. 

Frances  G.  Walett 
Professor  of  History 
Worcester,  Mass. 

Socorro,  N.  M.,  Aug.  20, 1879 
Dear  Clara, 

Have  always  had  considerable  curiosity  in  regard  to  this  country 
which  lies  above  me  on  the  Rio  Grande  and  am  right  glad  now  that 

10.  Ibid.,  April  6,  1882. 


NOTES  83 

I  decided  to  go  home  this  way  as  it  has  been  the  means  of  giving  me 
some  views  and  experiences  different  from  what  I  have  ever  encoun- 
tered before  and  which  the  Railroad  will  make  impossible  in  another 
year  or  two. 

The  Railroad  ends  at  Las  Vegas.  From  there  I  took  a  stage  over  the 
mountains  to  Santa  Fe.  The  journey  passed  without  incident  but  the 
same  coach  and  driver  on  their  return  next  day  were  stopped  by 
Robbers  who  searched  persons  and  baggage  for  money  and  valuables 
cut  open  the  mail  sacks  and  finally  took  away  the  horses  leaving  the 
passengers  to  pursue  their  course  afoot  and  without  money.  Santa  Fe  is 
a  pleasant  old  town  very  similar  to  Santonio  [sic]  Texas  in  population 
and  habits  of  the  people.  No  one  knows  how  old  the  town  is  but  about 
fifty  years  before  the  Pilgrims  landed  at  Plymouth  the  Spanish  took 
possession  made  Roman  Catholics  of  the  people  imposed  their  language 
on  them  and  there  has  been  no  change  since  then.  For  over  thirty  years 
it  has  been  military  headquarters  and  Capital  of  one  of  our  Territories 
but  the  Americans  have  made  no  impression  on  the  Mexican  population. 

I  have  often  heard  of  palaces  and  at  Santa  Fe  there  exists  a  genu- 
ine palace  over  two  hundred  years  old  where  the  Deputies  of  the  King 
of  Spain  used  to  live  when  Spain  was  the  richest  and  most  powerful 
Kingdom  in  the  world.  Of  course  I  went  to  see  the  Palace.  It  is  built  of 
mud  as  in  fact  are  most  of  the  residences  in  New  Mexico. 

I  was  very  much  interested  in  a  visit  which  I  paid  to  one  of  these 
Indian  Pueblos  as  they  are  called. 

The  Pueblo  which  I  visited  is  called  YSLETA  and  consists  of  over 
a  hundred  families  which  live  in  adobe  houses  of  two  or  three  rooms 
each  crowded  close  together.  I  suppose  their  ancestors  have  occupied  the 
houses  for  a  thousand  years.  They  have  no  chairs  or  other  superfluous 
furniture.  The  mattresses  and  blankets  which  they  sleep  on  at  night  are 
piled  against  the  walls  of  the  rooms  and  serve  for  seats  during  the  day. 

They  use  their  own  vernacular  in  conversation  with  each  other  but 
understand  enough  Spanish  so  that  I  could  get  along  with  them.  Each 
family  has  a  farm  of  from  fifty  to  a  hundred  acres  outside  of  the  settle- 
ment and  are  much  more  industrious  than  the  Mexicans.  Everyone  raises 
corn  wheat  and  vegetables  besides  grapes  pears  and  peaches.  In  each 
man's  field  there  is  a  platform  erected  overlooking  the  whole  field  and  a 
sort  of  canopy  erected  over  this  platform  out  of  bushes  and  weeds  mak- 
ing it  shady  and  comfortable.  All  through  the  fruit  season  the  women 
bring  their  sewing  and  sit  on  the  platform  through  the  day  and  the  man 
himself  watches  at  night  to  see  that  his  neighbors  do  not  get  away  with 
his  fruit. 

The  men  wear  their  hair  long  and  dress  in  the  traditional  Indian 
custom  and  the  women  dress  uniformly  in  a  costume  which  is  doubtless 
inherited.  Their  skirts  cloak  etc  reach  only  to  the  Knees,  below  they 
wrap  their  calves  with  a  sort  of  white  cotton  duck  various  folds  about 
half  an  inch  thick.  Of  course  they  all  wear  mocassins. 

Yesterday  the  driver  broke  the  tongue  of  the  coach  and  transferred 


84  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

us  three  passengers  to  an  open  lumber  wagon.  At  the  next  station  they 
hitched  into  the  wagon  the  four  powerful  and  fat  horses  which  are 
accustomed  to  pull  the  heavy  coach.  The  wagon  weighed  nothing  to  them. 
In  a  very  few  minutes  they  stampeded  and  we  had  a  magnificent  run- 
away for  about  three  miles  splashing  through  irrigating  ditches  and 
bounding  along  with  the  wagon  apparently  in  the  air  most  of  the  time. 
Finally  I  took  the  lines  of  the  wheel  horses  and  held  them  down  in  the 
trail  while  the  driver  threw  his  weight  onto  the  lines  of  the  leaders, 
the  lines  all  held,  nothing  broke  about  the  wagon  and  I  am  here  to 
write  about  it.  The  other  two  passengers  jumped  out  but  nobody  was 
hurt. 

Affectionately 

Sam 

Preparatory  to  reading  the  two  letters  below,  see  William 
J.  Parish,  "The  German  Jew  and  the  Commercial  Revolution 
in  Territorial  New  Mexico  1850-1900,"  in  the  New  Mexico 
Historical  Review,  April,  1960.  F.  D.  R. 

March  12, 1960 
Wm.  J.  Parish,  Dean 
College  of  Business  Administration, 
The  University  of  New  Mexico, 
Albuquerque,  N.  Mex. 
Dear  Dean  Parish, 

I  have  your  letter  of  March  8  and  am  happy  to  give  you  some  of 
the  answers  you  requested. 

In  your  third  paragraph  you  ask  about  the  relationship  between 
Sam  and  Julius  Freudenthal.  Sam's  father  was  Joseph  who  was  a 
brother  of  Julius. 

In  the  fourth  paragraph  you  mention  the  biography  of  Isadore 
Elkan  Solomon  (by  his  grandson  A.  I.  Ramenof sky) .  I  believe  you  are 
referring  to  Mrs.  Abe  Ramenofsky,  rather  than  her  husband  Doctor 
Ramenof  sky,  as  I  know  she  was  the  one  who  prepared  the  material  you 
quote  from.  Mrs.  Ramenofsky  is  a  grand  daughter  of  Mr.  Isadore  Elkan 

Solomon. 

*       *       * 

Yours  sincerely, 
LEF/h  L.E.  Freudenthal 

May  27, 1960 
Dear  Dean  Parish: 

I  just  had  the  opportunity  to  read  the  second  installment  of  your 
article  in  the  New  Mexico  Historical  Review  on  the  German-Jew.  I 
enjoyed  it  thoroughly.  It  is  extremely  well  written  and  brought  out 


NOTES  85 

many  interesting  aspects  of  the  effect  of  these  immigrants  on  life  in  the 
territorial  days. 

I  note  that  I  made  an  error  in  my  memorandum  of  March  2  wherein 
I  stated  that  Adolph  Jacoby  founded  a  business  in  "Paraje,  now  called 
Colorado."  I  should,  of  course,  have  said  the  business  was  founded  in 
Colorado,  now  called  Rodey. 

There  are  a  few  minor  points  which  you  may  wish  for  your  records. 

(1)  My  father,  Phoebus  Freudenthal,  was  active  in  political  life  in  Dona 
Ana  County,  serving  seven  terms  as  County  Treasurer. 

(2)  Your  table  No.  3,  Page  133,  does  not  include  Julius  Freudenthal 
who  was  in  business  in  Belen  in  the  early  1840's,  thereby  being  one 
of  the  first  in  this  area. 

(3)  Julius  Freudenthal  was  married  in  Belen  to  a  Miss  Bazan  of  Mexi- 
can-Spanish descent.  I  note  there  is  a  Bazanville  on  the  outskirts  of 
Belen.  I  do  not  know  if  there  is  any  connection  with  her  family. 

(5)   I  believe  that  I  wrote  you  previously  that  your  reference  to  "A 
biography  of  Isador  Elkan  Solomon  by  his  grandson  A.  I.  Rame- 
nofsky"  is  incorrect.  The  biography  was  prepared  by  his  grand- 
daughter Mrs.  A.  I.  Ramenofsky. 
With  Best  Wishes 

Yours  sincerely, 

L.  E.  Freudenthal 

LEF/h 


The  following  correspondence  will  be  of  use  to  those  who 
have  occasion  to  read  James  Colquhoun,  The  Early  History  of 
The  Clifton-Morenci  District.  Printed  for  Private  Circulation 
by  William  Clowes  and  Son,  Ltd.,  London  and  Beccles.  F.  D.  R. 

Prof.  Frank  D.  Reeve 
Library  Building  211 
University  of  New  Mexico, 
Albuquerque,  N.  Mex. 
Dear  Professor  Reeve, 

I  have  delayed  answering  yours  of  March  11  until  I  was  able  to 
secure  a  copy  of  the  "Early  History  of  the  Clifton-Morenci  Mining  Dis- 
trict" by  James  Colquhoun.  This  is  a  gift  to  you  from  Mrs.  Helen  Katz, 
West  End  Avenue  at  95th  Street,  New  York  25,  N.Y.  I  trust  you  will 
send  her  an  acknowledgment  of  the  gift.  Mrs.  Katz,  for  your  informa- 
tion, is  the  daughter  of  Charles  Lesinsky,  who  was  a  brother  of  Henry 
Lesinsky.  I  am  sending  the  book  under  separate  cover. 

I  am  also  enclosing  the  original  letter  from  the  author  to  Mrs.  Katz, 


86  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

dated  February  1935  and  a  letter  to  me  from  Leo  Lesinsky,  brother  of 

Helen  Katz,  who  expresses  some  interesting  comments  about  the  book. 

*       *       * 

Yours  sincerely, 

L.  E.  Freudenthal 
h/LEF 

enc.  2  letters. 

cc.  Mrs.  Helen  Katz 

West  End  Avenue  at  95th  Street, 

New  York  25,  N.Y. 


Hotel  Marcy 

West  End  Avenue  at  95th  St. 

New  York  25 

April  5/60 
Dear  Louis, 

I  am  sending  here  with  the  copy  of  Colquhoun's  book  you  asked  for. 
You  will  see  that  it  was  sent  to  Helen  25  years  ago. 

I  have  just  re-read  the  book  and  I  think  that  the  author  has  not 
always  stuck  to  the  facts.  Henry  Lesinsky's  part  in  the  development  of 
the  mines  is  exaggerated  at  the  expense  of  Julius  Freudenthal  and  my 
father.  I  know  that  he  did  not  arrive  on  the  scene  until  Julius  and 
Charles  were  there — he  says  so  himself  in  his  letters  to  his  son,  Albert, 
which  Albert  published  privately. 

As  for  the  amount  received  for  the  mines,  my  father  often  told  me 
that  they  did  not  receive  the  entire  $1,200,000.  And  it  was  not  divided 
equally  between  Julius,  Henry  &  Charles.  Charles  received  $250,000, 
and  the  balance  was  divided  between  Julius  &  Henry,  Julius  receiving 
the  larger  amount. 

*       *       * 

Love  from  Helen  & 

Yours  truly, 

LeoL. 

Hotel  Del  Monte 
Del  Monte,  California 

llth  Feb.  1935 
My  dear  Mrs.  Katz, 

Many  thanks  for  a  very  charming  letter  of  appreciation,  which  gave 
me  something  pleasant  to  think  about. 

I  am  so  glad  that  the  tribute  which  I  paid  to  your  father  and  to 
those  who  were  with  him  has  been  received  in  such  a  nice  spirit. 

Believe  me 

Yours  sincerely 

James  Colquhoun 


NOTES  87 

Mesilla  Park,  New  Mexico 

March  6, 1960 

Dear  Frank : 

*  *       * 

The  articles  dealing  with  this  part  of  the  state  in  the  last  issue  of 
the  Historical  Review  were  far  from  inspired.  The  site  of  the  marker 
designating  the  Battle  of  Brazito  is  correct.  Neither  the  Conklings  or 
Mr.  Anderson  consulted  the  maps  of  the  Brazito  Grant  made  by  Stephen 
Archer  in  1856  for  the  benefit  of  the  court  and  at  its  order  for  adjudi- 
cation of  ownership.  The  old  buildings  at  that  place  and  the  relics  of  the 
battle  were  still  visible  in  1903  when  the  Grant  was  sold  in  subdivided 
farms.  The  promoters,  Galaher  and  Edwards,  marked  the  spot  on  the 
highway  opposite  the  battle.  Locally  it  is  known  as  the  battle  of  Temas- 
calitos  since  it  was  fought  near  a  collection  of  Apache  bathing  huts. 
That  name  does  not  come  from  the  peaked  mountains  some  six  miles 
away. 

In  its  first  installment,  the  article  on  Jewish  merchants  is  applicable 
only  to  that  portion  of  New  Mexico  north  of  Socorro.  South  of  that 
place,  merchandising  was  usually  a  means  of  financing  mining,  ranching 
or  land  development  or  a  combination  of  the  three.  The  Lesinskys,  Freu- 
denthals  and  Frank  Winston  are  notable  examples.  A  notable  omission 
among  the  names  was  that  of  Louis  Rosenbaum  who,  after  making  a 
fortune  in  New  Mexico,  went  east  and  took  over  a  little  gyp  firm  of  Sears 
and  Roebuck  which  he  made  respectable  and  prosperous.  The  Lohmans 

are  mentioned  but  they  were  not  Jews. 

*  *       * 

Sincerely, 

Adlai  [G.  A.  Feather] 

At  Sea— 
6  June  1960 
Prof.  F.  D.  Reeve 
Univ.  of  New  Mexico 
Library  Bldg.  211 
Albuquerque,  N.M. 
Dear  Professor  Reeve, 

Due  to  the  throes  of  moving  back  to  the  States,  I  am  quite  late  in 
replying  to  your  letter  of  3  May.  Indeed  I  have  no  objection  to  your 
publishing  my  letter  agreeing  with  Armstrong's  conclusions  as  to  the 
location  of  the  Brazito  battlefield. 

This  is  the  sort  of  sincere  disagreement  that  often  produces  infor- 
mation sources  generally  unknown.  I  am  very  interested  in  hearing  the 
basis  of  Mr.  Feather's  exceptions  to  Mr.  Armstrong's  deductions — and 
also  mine.  Maybe  he  has  dug  up  something  which  we  should  all  be  inter- 
ested in  if  it  assists  in  solving  this  fascinating  historical  question.  I 
myself  spent  several  years  digging  into  everything  I  could  find  relative 
to  Brazito,  rode  and  walked  over  most  of  the  ground  between  Berino 


88  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  Mesilla  Park  for  many  years,  and  based  my  conclusion  on  three 
independent  areas  of  investigation:  accounts  of  distances  by  partici- 
pants on  both  sides,  matching  terrain  descriptions  by  participants  on 
both  sides  with  the  actual  terrain,  and  restitution  of  the  course  of  the 
Rio  Grande  in  1850  on  to  a  modern  map  to  see  where  the  significant 
bends  of  the  river  100  years  ago  would  be  located  today.  All  three  lines 
of  investigation  came  to  about  the  same  area — just  north  of  present 
day  Berino. 

I  think  that  it  is  a  fine  thing,  that  after  so  long  some  interest  has 
been  aroused  in  one  of  New  Mexico's  landmarks  and  especially  since  it 
is  the  only  one  related  to  a  conflict  in  the  Mexican  War.  I'll  be  visiting 
the  Mesilla  Valley  area  within  two  months  and  plan  to  see  Mr.  Feather 
— maybe  one  of  us  can  persuade  the  other  he's  right. 

Sincerely, 

George  Ruhlen 
Col  US  Army 


^Mexico 


Historical  l^eview 


alace  of  the  Governors,  Santa  Fe 


1961 


April,  1961 


Editors 
FRANK  D.  REEVE  PAUL  A.  F.  WALTER 

Associates 

PERCY  M.  BALDWIN  GEORGE  P.  HAMMOND 

FRANCE  V.  SCHOLES  ELEANOR  B.  ADAMS 

BRUCE  T.  ELLIS 

VOL.  XXXVI  APRIL,  1961  No.  2 

CONTENTS 

Page 
A  Ride  from  Geronimo,  The  Apache 

Nellie  Brown  Powers 89 

Pascual  Orozco:  Chihuahua  Rebel 

Paige  W.  Christiansen 97 

British  Investment  and  the  American  Mining  Frontier,  1860-1914 

Clark  C.  Spence 121 

Frank  Bond :  Gentleman  Sheepherder  of  Northern  New  Mexico, 
1883-1915  (continued) 

Frank  H.  Grubbs 138 

West  of  the  Pecos  (concluded) 

E.  L.  Steve  Stephens 159 

Notes  and   Documents 175 

Book  Review 176 

THE  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW  is  published  jointly  by  the 
Historical  Society  of  New  Mexico  and  the  University  of  New  Mexico. 
Subscription  to  the  REVIEW  is  by  membership  in  the  Society — open  to  all. 
Dues,  including  subscription,  $5.00  annually,  in  advance.  Single  num- 
bers, except  a  few  which  have  become  scarce,  are  $1.00  each.  For  further 
information  regarding  back  files  and  other  publications  available,  see 
back  cover. 

Membership  dues  and  other  business  communications  should  be  ad- 
dressed to  the  Historical  Society  of  New  Mexico,  Box  1727,  Santa  Fe, 
N.  M.  Manuscripts  and  editorial  correspondence  should  be  addressed 
to  Prof.  Frank  D.  Reeve,  University  of  New  Mexico,  Albuquerque,  N.  M. 

Entered  as  second-class  matter  at  Santa  Fe,  New  Mexico 
PRINTED  AT  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  NEW  MEXICO,  ALBUQUERQUE 


NEW   MEXICO    HISTORICAL 
REVIEW 

VOL.  XXXVI  APRIL,  1961  No.  2 

A  RIDE  FROM  GERONIMO,  THE  APACHE 
By  NELLIE  BROWN  POWERS 

NATURE'S  skilled  Hand  never  placed  among  the  wild  beau- 
ties of  the  far  West,  a  lovelier  spot  than  the  little  nook 
called  the  Double  Spring  Ranch,  located  in  southwestern  New 
Mexico,  where  my  family  were  living  in  1885.  The  home  ranch 
land  lay  in  a  small  basin,  which  was  carpeted  with  green  luxu- 
riant grasses  and  studded  with  the  most  beautiful  of  wild 
flowers.  Rock-ribbed  mountains  and  towering  peaks,  like  an 
irregular  broken  wall,  shut  in  this  lovely  valley  as  though  it 
were  an  Eden  which  should  have  been  guarded  forever  from 
the  foot  of  man. 

Nearby  were  the  Mogollon  Range  of  mountains,  and  about 
three  miles  away  the  Gila  River  flowed,  rushing  as  fast  as  a 
horse  could  trot,  through  an  immense  canyon,  the  walls  of 
which  were  so  high  that  when  viewing  the  river  from  the  top 
rim,  it  looked  as  though  I  could  step  across  it. 

There  were  two  log  cabins  and  a  stockade  corral  on  the 
ranch.  Fred  and  Darius,  my  two  older  brothers,  lived  in  the 
smaller  of  the  two  cabins,  down  near  the  corral.  I,  a  young 
lady  of  eighteen  years,  lived  with  my  parents,  Henry  and 
Sally  Ann  Brown,  in  the  more  pretentious  large  log  cabin, 
which  consisted  of  two  bedrooms  and  a  large  living,  cooking, 
and  eating  room. 

This  large  room  had  a  large  open  fireplace  and  when  the 
evenings  were  cool  it  was  a  delight  to  pile  the  pinon  knots  into 
the  fire  and  hear  them  crackle.  There  was  also  a  piano  in  this 
room.  The  piano  had  been  shipped  from  the  east,  and  the 
Atchison,  Topeka  and  Santa  Fe  Railroad  had  brought  it  to 
Magdalena.  It  had  been  hauled  across  the  plains  of  San 

89 


90  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Augustine  to  the  ranch.  I  loved  to  play  the  piano  and  the  boys 
were  good  singers.  After  Mother  and  I  were  through  for  the 
day  with  the  household  duties  of  cooking,  she  would  pick  up 
her  knitting  and  with  a  warm  fire  blazing  on  the  hearth  my 
brothers  would  sing  while  I  played  the  piano.  Come  Back  to 
Erin,  Carry  Me  Back  to  Old  Virginny  and  Sweet  Violets  were 
always  favorites  with  the  boys. 

During  the  daytime  Fred,  Darius  and  father  were  busy 
with  usual  ranch  duties.  Timber  was  plentiful  and  there  were 
numerous  silver  aspens  and  tall  pines.  They  had  built  a  fine 
stockade  corral  and  were  busy  with  fence  building  and  cattle 
raising. 

At  the  side  of  the  large  cabin,  a  cascade  of  water  came 
leaping  down  from  a  large  spring,  throwing  its  crystal  spray 
in  the  sunlight,  until  the  air  seemed  filled  with  a  shower  of 
diamonds.  Below  the  cabin,  the  running  water  met  another 
little  stream  which  came  from  a  smaller  spring.  The  two 
streams  became  a  sparkling  purling  brook  which  in  its  on- 
ward flow  filled  the  air  with  the  rhythm  of  lapping  waters. 
The  brook,  in  its  downward  flight,  became  a  creek  which 
flowed  a  mile  below  us  into  a  stupendous  canyon.  The  two 
springs  gave  inspiration  for  the  name  of  the  ranch,  the  Double 
Spring. 

In  this  year  of  1885,  we  were  about  one  hundred  and  thirty 
miles  from  a  railroad,  eighty  miles  from  the  nearest  post- 
office,  and  fifteen  miles  distant  from  our  nearest  neighbors, 
who  lived  on  the  N-Bar  Ranch,  yet  no  thought  of  fear  or 
danger  ever  entered  my  mind. 

Many  a  day  I  rode  on  my  little  mustang  pony  and  followed 
trails  up  and  down  from  the  Gila  River,  in  places  where  the 
pony,  because  of  the  steepness  of  the  terrain,  would  cross  his 
front  feet.  At  other  times  I  would  walk  off  with  my  faithful 
dog,  Bringer,  and  with  my  small  pearl-handled  Smith  and 
Wesson  six-shooter,  I  would  practice  hitting  a  mark. 

With  the  mountains,  the  clearest  of  atmospheres,  the 
brightest  of  skies,  and  the  fairest  of  landscapes,  this  place  was 
ideal  for  Sunday  worship.  Bringer  seemed  to  know  when  it 
was  Sunday  and  he  would  start  on  ahead  of  us  as  we  went  to 
God's  Church,  the  great  out-of-doors,  under  His  blue  sky  to 


GERONIMO  91 

a  place  near  the  Gila  River.  Father  would  read  from  the 
Bible  and  there  would  be  prayers.  The  Lord  was  Our 
Shepherd. 

One  morning,  very  early,  I  heard  a  horseman  ride  by  our 
cabin  very  fast.  He  stopped  at  the  little  cabin  below  us  where 
Fred  and  Darius  slept.  Soon  after  we  had  heard  the  sound  of 
hoof  beats,  my  brother  Fred  knocked  urgently  on  our  cabin 
door.  I  heard  father  quickly  answer  the  knock  and  as  Fred 
came  in  the  door  he  said,  "Get  up  quick,  the  Apaches  are  at 
the  N-Bar  ranch,  only  fifteen  miles  away,  coming  this  way, 
and  we  must  get  out  of  here !" 

We  got  up  in  a  hurry,  but  our  faces  were  white  and  our 
hands  trembled  as  we  dressed.  We  looked  around  the  ranch 
for  means  of  escape,  but  the  harness  for  the  two  horses  father 
drove  with  the  buckboard  was  away  at  the  Gila  ranch  and  no 
one  dared  leave  to  go  after  it.  The  next  move  was  to  cut  off 
the  rooster's  head,  for  Chanticleer  could  make  no  sweet  music 
to  our  ears  on  such  a  morning. 

It  was  then  suggested  that  we  all  go  up  to  the  old  fort, 
located  on  a  high  hill  close  by.  We  would  build  it  up  as  best  we 
could,  take  our  ammunition  and  provisions  and  stay  there. 
We  set  out  as  soon  as  possible  for  the  old  fort  with  as  agile 
footsteps  as  the  red-skins  could  have  made. 

We  stayed  at  the  old  fort  two  days,  keeping  at  all  times  a 
sharp  look  around.  At  the  end  of  the  two  days,  two  cowboys 
driving  a  herd  of  cattle  put  in  an  appearance.  Fred  met  them 
and  told  them  of  the  horseman's  story.  The  cowboys  thought 
that  we  had  listened  to  an  unfounded  rumor.  They  said  that 
the  Apaches  were  not  off  the  reservation. 

We  believed  the  cowboys'  story  and  went  back  to  the 
cabins.  The  boys  were  soon  busy  chopping  down  trees  and 
building  fences,  never  stopping  to  think  how  far  the  ring  of 
a  woodsman's  ax  could  be  heard. 

At  the  end  of  another  three  days  Fred  saddled  up  and 
packing  another  horse,  he  set  out  for  Kingston  to  get  the  mail. 
One  day,  and  the  early  part  of  another,  slipped  by  when  all 
at  once  our  little  valley  was  full  of  horsemen,  about  thirty  in 
number.  Their  panting  horses  showed  how  hard  they  had 
ridden. 


92  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Fred  had  met  the  horsemen  after  he  had  traveled  part  way 
to  Kingston  for  the  mail.  They  told  him  they  were  glad  to  see 
that  he  was  alive,  and  that  they  were  on  their  way  to  see  if 
the  Browns  were  still  alive,  for  Geronimo  and  his  braves  were 
on  the  warpath. 

Fred's  eyes  streamed  with  tears  of  joy  that  we  were  alive 
and  safe.  His  lips  told  us  of  the  deeds  of  murder,  blood-shed, 
and  pillage  that  Geronimo  and  his  painted  demons  had  com- 
mitted. Though  greatly  perturbed,  Fred  had  thought  to  bring 
back  the  harness  for  the  two  horses  which  father  drove  with 
the  buckboard. 

We  were  almost  the  last  settlers  who  had  not  left  the 
country  for  places  of  safety  in  the  towns.  By  this  time  the 
country  was  full  of  Indians,  and  there  had  been  much  specu- 
lation as  to  whether  we  at  the  Double  Spring  Ranch  were 
among  the  missing  ones. 

With  an  old  Indian  fighter,  Mr.  Judge  Moore,  at  their 
head,  these  horsemen  had  determined  to  come  after  us.  Uncle 
Sam,  also,  had  his  troops  scattered  around,  and,  no  doubt,  if 
those  beautiful  cavalry  horses  could  have  stood  the  climate, 
Geronimo  and  his  Indians  would  have  been  soon  rounded  up 
and  captured.  The  U.  S.  Cavalry  horses  could  not  follow  a  trail 
day  after  day  like  the  native  pony,  and  they  soon  hobbled  and 
numbers  of  them  died,  and  I  think  some  of  the  soldiers  lost 
their  lives. 

"A  squadron  of  cavalry  riding  slow 

Crosses  the  plains  in  search  of  the  foe, 

Which  rides  ever  ahead. 

The  red  man's  trail  may  be  plain  to  the  eye, 

And  hunters  may  chase  as  the  crow  doth  fly — 

They  will  ever  be  led, 

For  the  red  man  rides  with  lightning  speed. 

No  rest  for  rider,  no  rest  for  steed — 

'Till  the  hidden  lair  is  won. 

The  soldier  in  chase  may  tire  or  fall, 

Worn  by  the  race,  or  struck  by  a  ball, 

Leaving  his  work  undone." — Anonymous 

We  soon  had  our  preparations  made  to  leave  the  Double 


GERONIMO  93 

Spring.  The  doors  and  windows  of  the  cabins  were  boarded 
up  and  nailed  shut.  An  inscription,  "Look  Out  for  Indians" 
was  nailed  on  the  door,  so  that  if  any  lone  cowboy  or  pros- 
pector came  that  way  he  would  be  warned. 

According  to  orders,  the  company  was  to  be  divided.  Part 
of  the  horsemen  were  to  go  ahead,  and  part  were  to  follow. 
Father  and  mother,  riding  in  the  buckboard,  and  I  on  my  pony 
were  to  be  in  the  middle  of  the  two  groups  of  horsemen.  No 
one  was  to  shoot  unless  they  saw  an  Indian. 

I  turned  for  one  last  look  at  the  beautiful  peaceful  little 
valley,  in  whose  bosom  we  had  started  our  home.  I  whistled 
for  Bringer,  who  for  some  unaccountable  reason  could  not  be 
induced  to  leave  the  cabin  door.  Afterwards,  I  often  won- 
dered if  the  coyote  that  used  to  come  out  in  the  open  and  howl 
so  much,  knew  what  became  of  him.  You  would  have  thought 
there  was  a  pack  of  fifty  coyotes  when  you  heard  that  one 
howl. 

Our  first  stop  after  leaving  the  Double  Spring  Ranch  was 
Indian  Springs,  five  miles  from  the  ranch,  where  we  saw 
moccasin  tracks.  This  place  was  probably  the  nearest  they 
had  come  to  us  on  the  ranch.  We  went  on  through  canyons 
and  over  hills  and  around  rocks  with  but  one  thought  in  our 
minds,  and  that  was  to  find  a  place  of  safety.  We  rode  all  day 
long  under  the  turquoise  sky  and  we  saw  no  one.  Once  we 
ran  into  a  heard  of  antelope  on  a  mesa,  but  they  were  anxious 
to  put  space  between  us,  and  their  nimble  feet  took  them  off 
in  a  hurry. 

Just  before  sunset,  we  espied  a  little  cabin  off  the  main 
road,  to  our  left.  We  did  not  intend  to  stop  here,  but  the 
leaders  of  our  little  band  decided  to  investigate  the  premises 
and  see  if  there  were  any  signs  of  Indian  work.  The  signs  were 
instantly  noticeable.  The  owner  of  the  little  mountain  home 
lay  dead  on  his  own  woodpile.  All  that  was  left  of  any  worth 
was  his  own  gun  leaning  up  against  a  large  leafy  pine  some 
forty  yards  from  the  cabin.  This  was  mute  evidence  that  the 
stealthy  sneak  had  come  between  the  man  and  his  only 
defense. 

This  man  had  been  the  owner  of  a  fine  time-piece,  a  large 
clock.  The  clock  had  been  torn  apart  and  most  thoroughly 


94  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

dissected.  The  clock  had  so  intrigued  the  red  skin  that  the 
man's  gun  went  unnoticed  or  forgotten.  Later  we  heard  of  an 
Apache  who  wore  a  long  string  of  clock  wheels  for  ear-rings. 

It  was  determined  that  the  dead  man's  name  was  Papa- 
naugh.  The  men  dug  a  grave  and  buried  the  body.  I  wish  I 
could  forget  the  horror  and  anguish  of  that  sad  funeral. 
Though  the  Almighty  seemed  to  breathe  with  us  in  our 
prayers  and  fears,  we  were  shocked  and  terror-stricken  by 
the  murderous  death. 

We  would  not,  dare  not,  stay  there  so  pushed  on  up  one 
slope  and  down  another  until  we  had  crossed  the  Continental 
Divide.  Soon  after,  we  drew  rein  at  the  Adobe  Ranch  to  rest, 
as  best  we  could,  through  the  night.  The  Adobe  Ranch  was  a 
deserted  shambles  and  had  been  torn  all  to  pieces. 

The  moon  came  up  and  the  night  seemed  almost  as  bright 
as  the  day.  An  old  newspaper  was  handed  to  me,  and  I  found 
I  could  read  common  print  quite  readily.  The  horses  munched 
their  feed  and  in  the  silvery  gleam  of  moonlight  we  could  see 
the  landscape  for  miles  around  us.  The  scenery  was  richly 
colored,  picturesque,  and  magnificent.  Soon  we  saw  a  fire 
appear  on  one  of  the  high  hills  and  then  another  quite  a  dis- 
tance away.  The  old  Indian  fighter  told  us  these  were  Indian 
signal  fires,  set  by  the  Indians  as  a  means  of  communication 
between  marauding  bands.  The  wonder  of  that  anxious  night 
lives  vividly  in  my  memory,  as  I  was  most  alert. 

Day  dawned  and  we  saddled  up  and  took  the  trail  which  led 
through  Corduroy  Canyon.  It  was  thought  that  if  any  danger 
was  to  be  faced,  it  would  be  in  this  Canyon.  It  was  said  that 
possibly  Indians  were  awaiting  us  here.  It  was  a  likely  place 
for  an  ambush,  so  the  directions  were  given  to  ride  fast.  If 
any  shots  came  our  way,  our  safety  would  lie  in  the  speed  of 
a  fast  ride.  A  sense  of  urgency  seemed  to  hover  over  us. 

The  clatter  of  the  horses  hooves  on  the  solid  rock  of  the 
canyon  floor  and  the  noise  created  by  the  old  bake-kettle, 
which  had  broken  loose  in  the  back  of  the  buckboard,  and  was 
rolling  back  and  forth,  back  and  forth,  created  a  terrific  din. 
While  the  kettle  continued  to  roll  back  and  forth  in  the  back 
of  the  buckboard,  and  the  buckboard  was  proceeding  at  full 
speed  ahead,  with  father  holding  the  reins,  a  shot  rang  out ! 


GERONIMO  95 

Immediately  following  the  shot,  the  command,  "To  the 
Hills,  To  the  Hills  for  your  lives !"  was  shouted.  The  mustangs 
in  the  rear  of  the  group  scaled  the  walls  of  the  canyon  up  over 
steep  rocks  where  it  would  seem  a  man  could  scarcely  climb, 
if  on  foot.  The  riders  held  their  guns  in  their  hands  ready  to 
shoot  the  instant  an  Indian  was  sighted.  A  saddle  girth  broke, 
then  the  pony  bucked  and  off  went  his  rider,  saddle  and  all, 
in  a  heap.  The  bronc  with  head  up  charged  away. 

I  leaned  over  and  patted  my  pony's  neck  and  he  replied 
with  a  low  neigh.  I  reached  in  my  saddle  pocket  for  the  little 
six-shooter.  My  hand  did  not  tremble  now  as  I  cocked  it,  for 
I  thought,  "I'm  in  for  it,  I'll  fight,  but  I'll  die  game — like  an 
American  girl." 

This  all  happened  in  less  time  than  it  takes  to  tell  it,  and 
no  Indian  appeared  on  the  scene.  One  of  our  party  who  had 
ridden  very  fast  and  was  far  ahead,  now  came  riding  back  in 
a  rush,  to  tell  us  that  his  gun  was  discharged  by  accident.  We 
began  to  breathe  more  freely. 

After  a  hard  chase,  the  men  captured  the  unruly  pony 
and  gathering  the  procession  together  again,  we  proceeded 
all  day  without  further  interruption. 

Away  ahead  of  us,  we  saw  the  little  mining  town  of  Fair- 
view  appear  in  the  distance.  The  people  were  waiting  for  us 
with  that  open-hearted  hospitality  which  exists  in  a  new 
country. 

(Dear  (?)  old  long-gone-Geronimo,  I  have  always  been 
thankful  that  my  scalp  never  came  to  rest  as  an  ornament  for 
your  belt.  I  have  heard  that  red  was  your  favorite  color,  and 
my  hair  was  a  lively  curly  red.) 

A  nearness  of  five  miles  to  the  Apaches  was  a  plenty,  and 
though  I  have  since  heard  that  Geronimo  had  a  change  of 
heart,  I  would  not  care  to  play  the  game  of  running  from  the 
Apaches,  again. 

I  will  never  forget  that  just  as  the  sun  went  down  on  May 
28,  1885,  I  slid  from  my  saddle  into  my  brother's  arms  with 
such  a  sense  of  weariness  and  complete  exhaustion  that  I 
fainted  away.  Even  so,  my  brother  Darius  said,  "Nell  was  the 
grittiest  girl  in  all  New  Mexico  Territory  during  the  Indian 
raid  of  1885." 


96  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

A  Tribute  to  Geronimo 

"The  grandest  old  pagan  this  continent  has  produced  was 
Geronimo,  the  Apache,  who  has  at  last  gone  to  the  Happy 
Hunting  Grounds,  where  he  may  expect  a  lot  of  trouble.  In 
all  the  annals  of  the  human  race  there  is  no  finer  picture  of 
a  brute.  If  there  is  anything  in  the  theory  of  the  transmigra- 
tion of  souls,  Geronimo  must  have  descended  from  a  Bengal 
Tiger,  although  that  seems  hardly  fair  to  the  tiger. 

There  is  nothing  admirable  from  a  civilized  standpoint 
in  the  life  of  this  man,  but  as  an  exemplification  of  the  powers 
of  a  human  being  at  his  worst,  he  is  an  interesting  study.  He 
played  the  game  to  the  limit  without  restrictions  and,  judged 
from  his  own  standards  of  ethics,  was  a  success,  as  the 
bleached  bones  of  thousands  of  his  victims  testify.  There  need 
be  no  mock  heroics  over  his  death.  He  was  a  bad  man,  a  worse 
than  useless  man.  A  man  who  could  be  spared  and  who  ought 
to  have  been  spared  about  eighty  years  ago." 

Philadelphia  Enquirer 
*         *         * 

The  story,  "A  Ride  from  Geronimo,  the  Apache,"  was 
written  in  February  1909,  by  my  mother,  Nellie  Brown 
Powers.  Mother  was  of  Scotch-Irish-English  descent  and, 
after  reading  this  Tribute,  she  was  moved  to  put  into  words 
her  own  story,  which  is,  to  quote  mother,  "As  truly  and  cor- 
rectly written  as  I  could  dig  it  up  from  the  recesses  of  my 
memory." 

The  old  Indian  fighter,  Mr.  Judge  Moore,  was  the  oldest 
brother  of  Carrie  Nation. 

Isabel  Powers  Crutchett 
4827  Lomitas  Dr. 
San  Diego  16,  Calif. 

[A  point  of  view  of  bygone  days.  Would  that  the  Redman  had 
written  too.  F.D.R.] 

[NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW,  VoL  36,  No.  2.  April,  1961] 


PASCUAL  OROZCO:  CHIHUAHUA  REBEL 
Episodes  in  the  Mexican  Revolution,  1910-1915 

By  PAIGE  W.  CHRISTIANSEN* 

Before  the  nature  and  character  of  the  Mexican  Revolu- 
tion can  be  fully  understood,  the  men,  their  motives,  their 
actions,  and  their  characters  must  be  sorted  out,  understood, 
and  then  fitted  back  into  their  historical  context.  To  know 
only  the  major  leaders,  presidents  or  presidential  candidates, 
or  only  the  major  revolutionary  plans,  is  to  ignore  the  very 
essence  of  the  Revolution.  This  movement,  which  began  in 
1910,  is  too  important  to  Mexico  and  all  of  Latin  America  to 
rest  upon  inadequate  historical  knowledge.  The  story  of 
Pascual  Orozco,  Jr.,  storekeeper,  mule  skinner,  freighter, 
general,  and  bandit,  is  an  example  of  one  man  of  the  Revolu- 
tion who  is  known  and  yet  unknown.  Deeply  influenced  by 
regional  factors  and  by  his  environment,  Orozco  became  the 
symbol  of  revolution  to  many  of  the  people  of  Chihuahua. 

On  the  evening  of  November  19, 1910,  in  the  village  of  San 
Isidro,  Chihuahua,  Pascual  Orozco  pronounced  himself  in 
rebellion  against  the  government  of  Porfirio  Diaz.1  This  was 
part  of  a  chain  of  events  that  resulted  in  the  crushing  of 
federal  forces  in  the  state  of  Chihuahua  and  finally  in  the 
collapse  of  the  long  Diaz  dictatorship.  It  was  also  the  begin- 
ning of  a  short  but  brilliant  career  for  Pascual  Orozco,  whose 
subsequent  actions  had  a  direct  bearing  on  the  success  and 
fall  of  Francisco  Madero  and  Victoriano  Huerta.  The  story  of 
Orozco  is  also,  in  part,  the  story  of  Chihuahua  during  the 
chaotic  period  from  1910  to  1915. 

A  brief  background  will  help  set  the  stage  for  Orozco's 
activities.  Northern  Mexico  was  the  natural  theater  for  stag- 
ing the  revolt  against  Diaz,  and  Chihuahua  was  especially 
well  suited  as  the  battleground.  The  proximity  of  the  United 

*  Assistant  Professor  of  Humanities,  New  Mexico  Institute  of  Mining  and  Tech- 
nology, Socorro,  New  Mexico. 

1.  Juan  Gualberto  Amaya,  Madero  y  los  aut4nticos  revolutionaries  de  1910  (Mexico, 
1943),  p.  103  ;  Gustavo  Casasola,  ed.,  Historia  grdfica  de  la,  revolution,  1900-1940  (Mexico, 
n.d.),  I,  210,  says  Orozco  pronounced  on  November  20;  Joaquin  Marquez  Montiel,  S.J., 
Hombres  ceUbres  de  Chihuahua  (Mexico,  1958),  pp.  220-222. 

97 


98  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

States  border,  the  presence  of  a  frontier  society,  the  remote- 
ness of  the  northern  states  from  Mexico  City,  regional  eco- 
nomic interests,  and  the  importance  of  the  main  line  railroads 
which  traversed  the  north,  all  played  a  role  in  centering  revo- 
lutionary activity  in  this  area.  Added  to  these  general  con- 
siderations was  the  agitation  of  the  Mexican  Liberal  Party 
which  had  resisted  Diaz  for  many  years.2 

By  1908,  political  and  economic  conditions  across  northern 
Mexico  had  reached  a  critical  stage.  To  further  complicate  the 
situation  a  financial  crisis  and  recession  in  the  United  States 
reached  Chihuahua  in  June,  1908,  causing  serious  unemploy- 
ment. There  followed  a  number  of  incidents  which  were  to 
leave  the  northern  border,  particularly  Chihuahua,  in  an 
extremely  nervous  and  tense  state.  On  June  19,  twenty  Mexi- 
cans were  arrested  at  Casas  Grandes  for  a  proposed  plan  to 
seize  the  Union  Mercantile  store  at  Dublan  and  the  Ketelsen 
and  Degonau's  store  at  Casas  Grandes.  Both  establishments 
had  substantial  quantities  of  arms  and  ammunition  in  stock.3 
The  same  day  arrests  were  made  at  Nueva  Casas  Grandes. 
Among  those  arrested  was  Santa  Ana  Perez,  who  had  led  sev- 
eral attacks  on  the  Palomas,  Mexico,  customs  house  in  1893.4 
Nineteen  of  those  arrested  were  indicted  for  revolutionary 
activity  June  21.  The  rest,  including  Perez,  were  released.5 

Three  other  serious  raids  took  place  toward  the  end  of 
June,  1908.  One  at  Villa  Viesca  in  Coahuila,  where  raiders 
robbed  the  post  office,  bank,  and  express  office  and  fled  toward 

2.  For  general  conditions  and  events  leading  to  the  1910  rebellion  see  U.  S.  National 
Archives,  Marion  Letcher,  consul,  to  W.  J.  Bryan,  Sec.  of  State,   Chihuahua,  Mexico, 
October    17,    1913,    file    No.    812.00/9484,    in    Bancroft    Library    Microfilm    Collection, 
Cumberland    Film.    Hereafter   microfilmed    Ms.    from    this    collection    will   be   cited    as 
National  Archives  with  appropriate  Ms.   information.   For  a  discussion   of  the  whole 
problem  of  the  free  zone,  free  ports,  economic  conditions,  and  northern  sectionalism  see 
Ulises  Irigoyen,  El  problema  economico  de  las  fronteras  Mexicanaa  (Mexico,  1935),  2  vols., 
passim.  For  a  detailed  account  of  the  activities  and  political  ideas  of  the  Flores  Magon 
brothers  see  Myra  Ellen  Jenkins,  "Ricardo  Flores  Magon  and  the  Mexican  Liberal  Party, 
1900-1922,"  unpublished  Ms.,  The  University  of  New  Mexico,  Albuquerque,  1953.  Some  of 
the  violence  in   Chihuahua  is   described  in   Charles   Kindrick,   consul,   to  William   Day, 
Asst.  Sec.  of  State,  Cuidad  Juarez,  Feb.  17,  1898,  in  U.  S.  National  Archives,  Microfilm 
Publications,  Consular  Dispatches,  Ciudad  Juarez,  Mexico.  Hereafter  cited  as  Microfilm 
Publications  with  appropriate  information. 

3.  The  Mexican  Herald,  Mexico  City,  1898-1914,  daily,  June  20,  1908.  Hereafter  cited 
as  Herald. 

4.  Ibid.,  June  20,  1908  ;  Thomas  Cattam  Romney,  The  Mormon  Colonies  in  Mexico 
(Salt  Lake  City,  1938),  pp.  310-314. 

5.  Herald,  June  21,  1908. 


OROZCO  99 

Torreon.  Torreon  was  placed  in  a  state  of  emergency  and 
1,000  federal  troops  were  placed  in  the  field  to  pursue  the 
raiders.6  At  Las  Vacas,  across  the  border  from  Del  Rio,  Texas, 
a  group  of  Mexican  rebels,  organized  and  armed  in  the  United 
States,  attacked  the  federal  garrison.  They  immediately  re- 
turned to  the  United  States,  closely  pursued  by  Mexican 
police.7  On  June  19,  a  small  band  of  twenty  to  forty  men  made 
an  attack  at  Casas  Grandes.  This  same  group  attacked  Palo- 
mas  June  30.  There  was  some  evidence  that  this  group  was 
organized  in  the  United  States  since  a  band  of  Mexicans  was 
reported  seen  near  Columbus,  New  Mexico,  prior  to  the 
attack.8  For  the  most  part  these  disturbances  were  not  rebel- 
lions but  rather  protests  of  hungry  and  jobless  men  easily 
persuaded  to  violence. 

The  uprisings  or  raids  of  1908,  minor  though  they  were, 
succeeded  in  stirring  up  and  increasing  the  general  unrest, 
and  coupled  with  the  growth  of  the  anti-reelection  movement, 
they  set  the  stage  for  open  rebellion  in  Chihuahua.  A  cause 
was  needed,  and  a  leader.  Madero  became  the  symbol  and 
inspiration,  but  real  leadership  in  Chihuahua  was  to  rise  from 
among  the  many  men  who  led  local  rebellions  in  November, 
1910. 

The  pronouncement  of  rebellion  by  Pascual  Orozco  at  San 
Isidro  was  only  one  among  many  such  declarations  issued  in 
Chihuahua  on  November  19  and  20, 1910,  in  answer  to  the  call 
of  Madero  and  in  the  name  of  the  Plan  of  San  Luis  Potosi. 
Near  San  Andres,  Chihuahua,  Cerferno  Perez,  Francisco 
Villa,  and  Castulo  Herrera  declared  their  rebellion  and  moved 
to  attack  San  Andres,  a  main  point  on  the  Mexican  North- 
western Railroad.  In  Parral,  Guillermo  Baca,  Pedro  T.  Gomez, 
and  Miguel  Baca  Ronquillos,  supported  by  three  hundred 
men,  temporarily  drove  federal  troops  from  the  city.  In  Te- 
mosachic,  Chihuahua,  Jose  la  Luz  Blanco  "pronounced"  and 
moved  to  join  Orozco  near  Ciudad  Guerrero,  Chihuahua.9 
There  were  also  uprisings  near  Casas  Grandes  and  Ojinaga. 

6.  Ibid.,  June26  and  27,  1908. 

7.  Ibid.,  June  28,  1908. 

8.  Ibid.,  July  1,  1908. 

9.  Amaya,   pp.    105-108 ;    Casasola,    I,   213-215 ;   Alfonso   Taracena,   Mi   vida,  en  el 
vertigo  de  la  revolution  Mexicana:  anales  sinticos  (Mexico,  1936),  p.  102. 


100  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

For  the  most  part  these  small  isolated  groups  were  unable  to 
hold  their  initial  gains,  and  there  was  little  or  no  conscious 
co-operation  between  them. 

To  successfully  follow  the  rise  of  a  revolutionary  leader  in 
Chihuahua  it  is  necessary  to  return  to  San  Isidro  and  the 
activities  of  Pascual  Orozco.  He  did  not  hold  leadership  alone 
at  the  beginning  of  action  in  the  District  of  Guerrero,  Chihua- 
hua. Don  Albino  Frias,  Sr.,  claimed  equal  or  predominant 
leadership,  which  was  respected  by  Orozco.  Their  first  action 
came  on  November  19,  1910,  and  was  aimed  at  Mifiaca,  Chi- 
huahua, which  they  captured  with  ease.  Frias  was  in  com- 
mand at  Mifiaca  and  Orozco  second  in  command.  Victor 
Amaya,  an  eye  witness  historian  to  many  of  the  events  of 
the  1910  revolution,  called  Frias  "the  first  chief  of  the  revolu- 
tion in  Chihuahua."  From  Mifiaca,  the  small  column  counter- 
marched to  San  Isidro  which  fell  to  them  on  November  20. 
With  two  minor  objectives  taken,  and  their  forces  growing, 
Frias  and  Orozco  ordered  an  attack  on  Ciudad  Guerrero.  The 
initial  assault  against  this  stronger  federal  garrison  was 
repulsed  but  the  rebels  surrounded  the  town  and  prepared 
for  further  assaults.10 

The  forces  of  Castulo  Herrera  and  Francisco  Villa  uncon- 
sciously aided  this  campaign.  Colonel  Yepes,  moving  from 
Chihuahua  City  with  reinforcements  for  Ciudad  Guerrero, 
was  ambushed  on  November  23  at  San  Andres  by  the  forces 
of  Herrera  and  Villa.11  While  the  federal  column  was  not  de- 
stroyed, it  was  forced  to  halt  its  advance  on  Ciudad  Guerrero, 
stopping  at  Pedernales.12  Villa  and  Herrera  continued  toward 
Chihuahua  City  after  their  partial  success  at  San  Andres. 
They  penetrated  as  far  as  Santa  Isabel  before  they  were 
turned  back  and  dispersed  by  General  Juan  Navarro  who  was 
moving  west  with  a  large  force  to  put  an  end  to  revolutionary 
activity  in  western  Chihuahua.13  Villa  and  a  few  of  his  men 
hurried  across  country  toward  Cuidad  Guerrero  to  join  a 
junta  of  revolutionary  leaders  suggested  by  Orozco.14  The 

10.  Amaya,  p.  104,  110  ;  Casasola,  I,  210. 

11.  Casasola,  I,  214-215 ;  Taracena,  p.  102. 

12.  Casasola,  I,  214-215. 

13.  Amaya,  p.  108. 

14.  Casasola,  I,  213-214. 


OROZCO  101 

timely  independent  action  of  Villa  and  Herrera  at  San  Andres 
allowed  Frias  and  Orozco  to  consolidate  their  forces  for  a  final 
assault  on  Ciudad  Guerrero. 

Learning  of  the  movements  of  Navarro,  Frias  dispatched 
Orozco  to  Pedernales  with  a  small  force  to  stop  or  delay  the 
federals  while  pressure  was  continued  on  Ciudad  Guerrero. 
Orozco  set  a  successful  ambush  on  November  26,  and  com- 
pletely routed  the  advance  guard  of  Navarro's  column  along 
with  the  remnants  of  the  federal  forces  that  had  been  waiting 
at  Pedernales  for  aid.15  Another  victory  secured,  Orozco  re- 
turned to  Ciudad  Guerrero  bringing  additional  supplies  cap- 
tured at  Pedernales.  With  the  aid  of  these  supplies  the  rebels 
launched  a  successful  attack  against  Ciudad  Guerrero  on 
December  4, 1910.16 

Following  the  fall  of  Ciudad  Guerrero,  Albino  Frias  relin- 
quished his  leadership  in  favor  of  Orozco.  Upon  taking  full 
command  of  rebel  forces  in  the  District  of  Guerrero,  Chihua- 
hua, on  December  6,  Orozco  issued  a  manifesto  to  the  nation 
in  which  he  dedicated  himself  and  his  men  to  the  Madero  cause 
and  called  for  the  complete  overthrow  of  the  Diaz  govern- 
ment.17 Orozco's  manifesto  was  the  first  formal  document 
issued  by  the  revolutionary  forces  actively  fighting  against 
the  federal  army  and  Mexican  police. 

The  success  of  the  rebel  forces  under  Frias  and  Orozco 
had  an  importance  way  out  of  proportion  to  the  amount  of 
men  and  equipment  employed.  They  were  not  military  engage- 
ments between  armies,  but  rather  skirmishes  between  small 
rebel  bands  and  isolated  federal  detachments.  They  were, 
however,  of  major  importance  for  the  future  of  the  revolu- 
tion. That  they  succeeded  while  other  revolutionary  activity 
generally  failed  magnified  the  importance  of  Minaca,  San 
Isidro,  Pedernales,  and  Ciudad  Guerrero.  Initial  success  had 
been  attained  at  Parral,  San  Andres,  Ojinaga,  and  other  spots 
of  rebellion  in  Chihuahua,  but  in  no  case  were  the  rebel  groups 
able  to  consolidate  their  victories.  Shortages  of  arms,  ammu- 


15.  Amaya,  p.  108. 

16.  Ibid.,  p.  108  ;  Casasola,  I,  211,  says  that  the  first  armed  triumph  for  the  Madero 
revolution  was  accomplished  by  Orozco  at  Ciudad  Guerrero. 

17.  Francisco  Ramirez  Plancarte,  La  revolution  Mexicans.  (Mexico,  1948),  pp.  232- 
233  n  ;  Amaya,  p.  110. 


102  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

nition,  and  food  supplies  quickly  caused  their  collapse.  Orozco 
was  also  faced  with  serious  supply  problems  after  taking 
Ciudad  Guerrero,  and  it  is  a  credit  to  his  ability  as  a  leader 
that  he  was  able  to  hold  his  forces  together  when  they  had 
little  to  sustain  them  in  any  kind  of  military  action. 

Orozco's  succession  to  leadership  in  the  District  of  Gue- 
rrero, coupled  with  his  success  against  federal  troops,  drew 
the  harassed  remnants  of  other  revolutionary  bands  into  his 
camp.  Men  like  Francisco  Villa,  Castulo  Herrera,  and  Jose 
la  Luz  Blanco,  along  with  their  followers,  came  together  un- 
der the  command  of  Orozco  to  form  a  loose  military  unit.18 
The  first  action  of  elements  of  this  enlarged  command  was  at 
Cerro  Prieto  where  forces  under  Orozco  and  Francisco  Salido 
attacked  federal  troops  commanded  by  General  Navarro.  The 
fight  at  Cerro  Prieto  was  the  first  in  which  rebel  forces  could 
be  called  an  army  with  a  chain  of  command  and  a  predeter- 
mined battle  plan,  informal  though  it  was.  The  fight  also  set 
a  precedent:  prisoners  were  not  taken  alive  by  either  side. 
The  battle  was  lost,  but  the  "army"  of  Chihuahua  retained  its 
character  and  its  discipline.  The  rebels  were  forced  to  retire 
to  their  strongholds  around  Ciudad  Guerrero.19 

During  January,  1911,  Orozco,  still  centering  his  activities 
around  Ciudad  Guerrero,  met  federal  troops  in  several  en- 
gagements. They  successfully  ambushed  a  federal  column  at 
Mai  Paso  January  2,  la  Luz  Blanco  co-operating  with  Orozco 
in  this  attack.20  On  January  7,  Orozco  attacked  a  military  sup- 
ply train  at  Minaca  which  was  to  supply  General  Navarro, 
who  was  marching  on  Ciudad  Guerrero.  Although  this  de- 
prived Navarro  of  needed  supplies,  Orozco  realized  that  he 
would  be  unable  to  maintain  his  position  at  Ciudad  Guerrero 
and  he  ordered  a  retreat  into  the  mountains  of  western  Chi- 


18.  Bakersfield  Californian,  Dec.  13,  1910 ;  A  letter  from  Orozco  to  Francisco  Salido 
indicates  this  loose  association  and  their  method  of  operation,  Orozco  to  Salido,  Peder- 
nales,  Mexico,  Dec.  11,  1910,  trans.,  in  U.  S.  Department  of  State,  Papers  Relating  to 
the  Foreign  Relations  of  the   United  States    (Washington,    1863-194-),    1911,   412-413. 
Hereafter  cited  as  Foreign  Relations  with  appropriate  date. 

19.  Bakersfield  Californian,  Dec.   14,  1910 ;  Casasola,  I,  224  ;   Pascual  Ortiz  Rubio, 
La  revolucion  de  1910,  apuntes  historical  (Mexico,  1929),  p.  177. 

20.  "Survey  of  the  World,"  Independent,  LXX,  7    (Jan.  5,  1911).  Hereafter  cited 
only  as  Independent  with  proper  issue ;  Taracena,  p.  104 ;  Ortiz  Rubio,  p.  177  ;  Marquez 
Montiel,  p.  222. 


OROZCO  103 

huahua.21  There  Orozco  managed  to  maintain  his  forces  in 
relative  safety  from  attack,  and  he  accumulated  a  store  of 
arms  and  ammunition  which  filtered  down  from  Madero's 
agents  in  the  United  States.22 

The  success  of  the  revolution  was  seriously  in  doubt 
during  the  waning  weeks  of  1910  and  January  1911.  Most  of 
the  initial  victories  by  the  rebels  had  been  dissipated,  and 
federal  authorities  were  confident  that  the  pocket  of  resist- 
ance in  Chihuahua  would  soon  collapse.  The  small  rebel 
successes  which  had  been  accomplished  were  of  Orozco's 
doing.  His  greatest  achievement  was  that  he  maintained  an 
"army"  at  all.  Madero,  in  whose  name  he  fought,  was  still  in 
the  United  States  and  could  see  little  cause  for  entering  Mex- 
ico as  provisional  president  and  symbol  of  a  revolution  that 
barely  existed.  The  future  success  of  the  revolt  was  in  the 
hands  of  the  ex-storekeeper  and  freighter,  Pascual  Orozco, 
who  was  optimistic  and  preparing  for  new  assaults  on  the 
Diaz  dictatorship. 

By  early  January,  1911,  Orozco  was  recognized  by  most 
observers  as  the  military  commander  of  the  revolutionary 
forces  in  the  state  of  Chihuahua,  and  the  revolution  was  being 
given  a  chance  in  some  quarters.23  In  mid-January,  Orozco 
had  sufficient  supplies  and  circulated  rumors  that  he  was 
ready  to  attack  Chihuahua  City.  This  was  a  feint,  and  rebel 
forces  moved  toward  Ciudad  Juarez.24 

The  first  rebel  attempt  to  take  a  major  border  point, 
always  a  key  part  of  their  strategy,  was  under  way.  After 
several  skirmishes  with  federal  troops  in  the  mountains  of 
northwestern  Chihuahua,  Orozco  decided  to  split  his  forces, 
sending  one  column  along  the  Mexican  Northwestern  Rail- 
road, the  other,  under  his  command,  along  the  Mexican  Cen- 
tral Railroad.25  By  February  3,  Orozco  felt  that  he  had  suffi- 
cient control  of  the  approaches  to  Ciudad  Juarez  and  informed 


21.  Herald,  Jan.  8,  1911 ;  El  Correo  de  la,  Tarde,  Mazatlan,  Sinaloa,  Mexico,  Jan.  10, 
1911 ;  Taracena,  p.  109. 

22.  Abraham  Gonzales,  leader  of  the  anti-reelection  party  in  Chihuahua  and  staunch 
Maderista^  was  perhaps  the  most  active  of  the  agents  that  supplied  arms  and  supplies 
to  the  rebels  in  Chihuahua. 

23.  Herald,  Jan.  5,  1911. 

24.  Ibid.,  Jan.  25,  1911 ;  Independent,  LXX,  222  (Feb.  2,  1911). 

25.  Casasola,  I,  226 ;  Independent,  LXX,  222  (Feb.  2,  1911). 


104  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

the  mayor  and  the  foreign  consuls  that  he  would  begin  a  bom- 
bardment that  afternoon.26  Failure  of  expected  reinforce- 
ments caused  him  to  hold  off,  and  on  February  5,  Colonel 
Rabago  and  some  three  hundred  men  fought  their  way 
through  rebel  lines  and  reinforced  the  federal  garrison.  This 
addition  to  federal  strength  discouraged  Orozco,  the  more  so 
when  he  heard  that  additional  federal  troops  were  being 
rushed  from  Chihuahua  City.  He  gave  up  the  attack  and  re- 
treated south,  down  the  Mexican  Central  Railroad.27  On  Feb- 
ruary 14,  General  Navarro  with  1,500  troops  entered  Ciudad 
Juarez.28  The  first  substantial  effort  of  rebel  forces  to  take  a 
port  of  entry  had  failed,  but  there  was  no  doubt  that  a  dis- 
ciplined rebel  army  was  operating  in  Chihuahua. 

The  withdrawal  of  Orozco  from  Ciudad  Juarez  placed 
Madero  in  an  awkward  position.  It  was  evident  that  Orozco 
had  assembled  an  army  capable  of  concerted  military  action. 
There  were  those  among  Madero's  advisers  who  felt  he  should 
be  with  the  troops  in  Mexico  so  he  could  assume  true  leader- 
ship in  fact  as  well  as  in  name.  There  were  others  who  thought 
it  would  be  dangerous  to  the  revolution  for  Madero  to  enter 
Mexico  until  there  was  more  positive  evidence  of  success.  The 
former  position  won  out  and  on  receipt  of  the  news  of  Oroz- 
co's  withdrawal  from  Ciudad  Juarez,  Madero  apologized  to 
Orozco  and  his  men  for  his  absence.29  On  February  13,  Madero 
entered  Mexico  at  Zaragoza,  fifteen  miles  southeast  of  Ciudad 
Juarez.30  Orozco  and  his  forces  returned  to  their  mountain 
strongholds  west  of  Chihuahua  City  where  they  were  joined 
by  Madero  in  the  latter  part  of  February.31 

The  meeting  of  Madero  and  Orozco  brought  together  for 
the  first  time  the  symbolic  leader  of  the  revolution  and  the 
active  military  commander.  It  was  hardly  a  case  of  mutual 
admiration.  Madero  had  no  knowledge  of  or  appreciation  for 
the  capabilities  of  Orozco,  and  he  brought  with  him  a  com- 

26.  London  Times,  Feb.  4.  1911 ;  El  Correo,  Feb.  6,  1911. 

27.  El  Correo,  Feb.  7  and  Feb.  14,  1911 ;  Herald,  Feb.  9,  1911 ;  Casasola,  I,  229. 

28.  Independent,  LXX,  281,  330,  880  (Feb.  9,  16,  23,  1911)  ;  London  Times,  Feb.  16, 
1911. 

29.  Charles  Cumberland,  The  Mexican  Revolution:  Genesis  Under  Madero  (Austin, 
Texas,  1954),  p.  129. 

30.  Casasola,  I,  230. 

81.  El  Correo,  Feb.  14,  1911 ;  Independent,  LXX,  431  (March  2,  1911). 


OROZCO  105 

plete  military  staff.  It  must  have  been  difficult  for  the  two 
men  to  understand  one  another  due  to  their  different  back- 
grounds. Orozco  was  low  born,  almost  illiterate,  crude,  and 
capable  of  extreme  brutality,  while  Madero  was  a  wealthy 
aristocrat,  well  educated,  a  mystic,  and  basically  gentle.  The 
problem  at  hand,  the  defeat  of  federal  forces,  became  their 
only  common  ground. 

Madero's  failure  to  recognize  Orozco's  abilities  as  a  leader 
resulted  in  a  temporary  split  between  the  two  men.  Orozco, 
resentful  of  outside  competition  for  command  of  rebel  forces 
in  Chihuahua,  had  no  place  for  and  no  desire  to  use  the  men 
who  Madero  offered. 

In  late  February,  Madero,  acting  on  advice  of  his  advisers 
rather  than  on  Orozco's,  determined  to  attack  Casas  Grandes, 
a  federal  strongpoint  on  the  Mexican  Northwestern  Railroad. 
Orozco  was  left  out  of  this  action  and  remained  in  the  District 
of  Guerrero,  though  some  of  his  men  saw  action  at  Casas 
Grandes.  There  were  notable  critics  of  the  decision  to  attack 
Casas  Grandes.  Abraham  Gonzales,  leader  of  the  anti-reelec- 
tion party  in  Chihuahua,  and  active  in  securing  arms  in  the 
United  States,  and  Francisco  Villa,  felt  that  more  would  be 
accomplished  by  capturing  a  border  point,  preferably  Ciudad 
Juarez  or  Ojinaga.  Casas  Grandes,  even  if  taken,  could  serve 
no  useful  purpose.32  Madero  was  firm,  however,  and  the  at- 
tack on  Casas  Grandes  began  March  5.  What  followed  was 
the  most  decisive  defeat  and  slaughter  suffered  by  the  rebels 
during  the  revolution.33 

Madero,  realizing  after  the  disaster  at  Casas  Grandes  that 
his  best  chance  for  success  was  with  Orozco  and  his  men,  re- 
turned to  the  south  and  joined  Orozco  at  Bustillos.34  For  a 
time  the  two  cooperated,  and  put  into  operation  a  plan  to 
take  a  border  point.  Slowly  rebel  forces  moved  north  toward 
Ciudad  Juarez  and  Ojinaga.  By  early  April  they  succeeded 
in  gaining  control  of  the  Mexican  Central  and  the  Northwest- 

82.  The  Mexican  Ambassador  to  the  Department  of  Justice,  Mexican  Embassy, 
Washington,  Mar.  17,  1911,  with  an  enclosure  of  a  letter  by  Abraham  Gonzales,  in 
Foreign  Relations,  1911,  427-428  ;  the  Villa  position  was  stated  in  Edgcumb  Pinchon, 
Viva.  Villa,  (New  York,  1933),  p.  148. 

88.  Alvin  R.  Kenner,  "The  Mexican  Revolution,"  Mining  and  Scientific  Press,  CII, 
621-624  (May  6,  1911)  ;  Casasola,  I,  231 ;  Independent,  LXX,  539  (March  6,  1911). 

84.  Casasola,  I,  256. 


106  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ern  railroads,  thereby  cutting  off  Ciudad  Juarez.33  On  April 
19,  Madero  demanded  the  surrender  of  the  city.36 

From  April  19  to  May  7  a  truce  prevailed  while  peace 
talks  were  carried  on.  The  talks  failed,  for  rebel  leaders  re- 
fused to  lay  down  their  arms  until  Diaz  resigned  from  the 
presidency.  The  work  of  the  peace  commission  broke  down 
and  the  talks  ended  May  7. 

During  the  course  of  the  truce,  the  military  situation  grew 
tense.  Orozco  and  Villa,  restless  at  the  delays,  wanted  to  at- 
tack while  they  still  held  a  military  advantage.  Friction  had 
also  developed  between  rebel  and  federal  soldiers  who,  under 
the  strain  of  the  long  period  of  inaction,  were  constantly 
harassing  one  another  with  insults.37  The  two  chieftains  and 
their  men  were  only  held  in  check  by  the  persuasive  abilities 
of  Madero. 

Even  with  the  collapse  of  negotiations  on  May  7,  Madero 
was  fearful  of  pushing  the  attack  on  Ciudad  Juarez.  Interna- 
tional complications  were  almost  certain  to  arise  out  of  a 
military  action  so  close  to  the  American  border.  In  a  state- 
ment issued  May  7,  Madero  indicated  that  rebel  forces  would 
be  withdrawn  from  Ciudad  Juarez  and  moved  south  in  a 
march  on  Mexico  City.38 

Orozco  and  his  men  were  not  so  fearful  of  the  nearness  of 
the  American  border.  On  May  8,  scattered  elements  of  the 
rebel  army  began  to  advance  on  Ciudad  Juarez,  triggering 
a  general  assault.  Evidence  does  not  indicate  whether  the 
attack  was  ordered  by  Orozco  or  Villa,  or  was  spontaneous. 
Once  under  way  there  was  little  Madero  could  do  but  give  his 
approval.  By  the  afternoon  of  May  10,  rebel  forces  had  occu- 
pied all  of  the  city  and  General  Navarro  surrendered  the 
federal  garrison.39 

Friction  developed  between  Madero  and  his  military 
leaders  over  the  disposition  of  the  federal  commander,  Juan 


85.  Ortiz  Rubio,  p.  178. 

86.  Herald,  April  20,  1911. 

87.  Ibid..  May  10,  1911. 

88.  Edwards,  consul,  to  Bryan,  Sec.  of  State,  Ciudad  Juarez,  May  7,  1911,  in  For- 
eign Relations,  1911,  477.  For  the  complete  text  of  the  Madero  statement,  see  Ramfrez 
Plancarte,  pp.  283-234  n. 

39.  Casasola,  I,  269-270;  Herald,  May  11,  1911;  Independent,  LXX,  1033    (May  18, 
1911). 


OROZCO  107 

Navarro.  Orozco  and  Villa  wanted  him  executed  immediately. 
They  remembered  the  fate  of  rebel  prisoners  at  Cerro  Prieto 
and  wanted  revenge.  Madero,  not  wishing  unnecessary  blood- 
shed or  unfavorable  publicity,  personally  escorted  Navarro 
to  safety  across  the  international  boundary. 

On  May  11,  Madero  named  his  provisional  cabinet  which 
brought  on  a  serious  mutiny.  The  fact  that  he  named  Venusti- 
ano  Carranza  Minister  of  War  enraged  Orozco  who  felt  he 
had  earned  the  appointment.  This,  coupled  with  the  escape 
of  Navarro  and  the  resentment  which  had  been  present  since 
Madero's  entry  into  Mexico,  prompted  Orozco  to  deal  harshly 
with  Madero.  Orozco,  Villa,  and  a  hundred  men  went  to  Ma- 
dero's quarters.  During  the  argument  that  followed,  Orozco 
was  only  restrained  with  difficulty  from  shooting  men  who 
came  to  the  defense  of  Madero,  and  for  a  time  the  Provisional 
President  himself  was  in  great  danger.40  He  talked  Orozcc 
out  of  the  worst  of  his  anger  and  the  matter  was  patched  up. 
However,  the  deep  resentment  and  distrust  that  had  devel- 
oped between  the  two  men  was  firmly  established. 

The  capture  of  Ciudad  Juarez  proved  to  be  the  key  victory 
in  the  revolt  against  Diaz  and  his  government.  It  placed  the 
federal  troops  at  Ojinaga  and  Agua  Prieta  in  an  impossible 
position,  forcing  them  to  give  up  these  border  points  to  rebel 
forces.41  Federal  power  in  northern  Chihuahua  was  broken, 
and  the  highly  touted  armies  of  Diaz  began  to  collapse 
throughout  Mexico.  The  army  Diaz  had  depended  upon  was 
honeycombed  with  graft,  its  generals  were  senile,  its  rank 
and  file  had  been  drawn  from  the  prisons  and  slums,  and  it 
proved  of  little  value  in  most  of  its  operations. 

The  first  phase  of  the  Mexican  revolution  was  nearing  its 
end.  On  May  15,  a  meeting  of  the  peace  commission  began 
and  on  May  17,  an  armistice  was  agreed  upon.  That  same  day 
Diaz  agreed  to  resign  by  the  end  of  the  month ;  he  signed  his 
resignation  on  May  25,  and  went  into  exile  in  Europe.  The 
revolution  had  succeeded. 

Orozco's  contribution  to  the  downfall  of  Diaz  cannot  be 


40.  Independent,  LXX,  1033  (May  18,  1911)  ;  New  York  Times,  Feb.  10,  1913.  Here- 
after cited  as  NYT  with  proper  date. 

41.  Independent,  LXX,  1033  (May  18,  1911). 


108  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

underestimated.  It  was  his  leadership  and  refusal  to  give  up 
in  the  face  of  what  looked  like  certain  failure  that  finally  gave 
unity  and  purpose  to  the  rebels  of  Chihuahua.  The  combina- 
tion of  an  idealistic  and  outspoken  Madero,  and  the  leader- 
ship and  fighting  abilities  of  Orozco  spelled  success  for  the 
revolution.  To  give  all  of  the  credit  to  Madero  is  to  com- 
pletely overlook  a  large  segment  of  Mexican  history  of  that 
period.  A  number  of  men  in  many  parts  of  Mexico  brought 
down  the  Diaz  regime  and  Orozco  in  Chihuahua  ranks  among 
the  most  important.  Joaquin  Marquez  Montiel,  S.J.,  Chihua- 
hua historian,  said  about  Orozco, 

"This  revolutionary  military  jefe  was  the  first  to  raise  in  arms 
against  the  Porfirian  dictatorship  and  one  of  the  principal  fac- 
tors in  the  triumph  of  the  Maderista  revolution."42 

The  period  from  the  fall  of  Ciudad  Juarez  to  March,  1912, 
was  a  time  of  resentment  and  dissatisfaction  for  Pascual 
Orozco.  The  wealth  and  power  he  had  anticipated  as  his  re- 
ward for  service  in  the  revolution  never  materialized  to  a  de- 
gree acceptable  to  him.  His  unrest  was  fed  by  anti-Madero 
elements  within  the  state  of  Chihuahua.  The  wealthy  groups 
who  earlier  would  not  have  associated  with  such  a  peon  up- 
start saw  in  Orozco  a  possible  tool  against  Madero.  This  ele- 
ment included  the  Church,  which  hated  Madero,  the  cientiji- 
cos  who  had  been  the  brains  of  the  later  Diaz  period,  all  the 
wealth  and  power  of  the  Terrazas  family,  and  the  political 
cunnings  of  Enrique  Creel.43  To  succeed  against  Madero  this 
group  needed  a  "stalking  horse,"  someone  who  had  demon- 
strated leadership  ability  and  could  count  on  the  support  of  a 
broad  base  of  the  population.  Orozco,  as  a  result  of  his  con- 
nection with  the  revolution  of  1910  was,  in  popular  fancy,  a 
great  hero,  and  the  victorious  ending  of  the  revolution  in  the 
interest  of  his  party  left  him  as  the  man  of  the  hour  in  the 
state.  Nor  was  he  unambitious.  He  passed  every  test  and  be- 
came the  man  of  the  reactionary  elements  in  Chihuahua. 

During  the  closing  months  of  1911,  plots  against  the 

42.  Marquez  Montiel,  p.  220. 

43.  National  Archives,  Letcher  to  Bryan,  Chihuahua,  Oct.  17,  1918    (812.00/9484)  ; 
NYT,  Feb.  10,  1918. 


OROZCO  109 

Madero  government  were  in  evidence  all  over  Mexico.  In  No- 
vember, 1911,  Bernardo  Reyes,  Emilio  Vasquez  Gomez,  and 
Emiliano  Zapata  plotted  a  revolt.  The  Plan  of  Ayala,  which 
supported  the  revolt,  recognized  Orozco  as  chief  of  the  revo- 
lution if  he  would  accept.  Article  three  of  the  Plan  said :  "Gen- 
eral Pascual  Orozco,  second  in  command  to  Francisco  Ma- 
dero, is  recognized  chief  of  the  Revolution  Libertadora,  and 
in  case  that  he  does  not  accept  this  office,  General  Don  Emili- 
ano Zapata  is  recognized  as  chief  of  the  revolution."44  Fed- 
eral authorities  used  this  article  plus  personal  correspondence 
they  claimed  to  have  intercepted  to  implicate  Orozco  in  the 
revolt.45  Orozco,  planning  his  own  rebellion,  with  hacendado 
backing,  publicly  disassociated  himself  with  the  November 
revolt.46  The  Zapata-Reyes- Vasquez  Gomez  movement  failed 
from  lack  of  support.  Reyes  was  arrested,  Vasquez  Gomez 
fled  to  the  United  States  and  plotted  further  revolutionary  ac- 
tion, and  Zapata  continued  his  guerrilla  activity  in  the  south. 
In  the  final  months  of  1911,  and  in  January,  1912,  Orozco 
nominally  remained  loyal  to  the  Madero  government.  In  De- 
cember, as  commander  of  the  state  militia,  he  took  the  field 
against  rebel  forces  supporting  Vasquez  Gomez.47  On  Janu- 
ary 20,  1912,  Orozco  was  in  Mexico  City  and  conferred  with 
Madero.  Rumors  circulated  at  this  time  that  Orozco  was  to 
be  sent  to  Morelos  to  put  down  the  Zapata  revolt,  but  these 
were  quickly  dispelled  by  Madero.48  When  he  returned  to 
Chihuahua,  Orozco  resigned  the  commission  as  commander 
of  the  state  militia  and  indicated  he  was  retiring  to  private 
life  to  work  for  an  American  mining  company  guarding  ore 
shipments.49  Later  events  showed  this  to  be  a  neat  bit  of 
propaganda. 


44.  Francisco   Naranjo,   Diccionario  biogrdfico  revolucionario    (Mexico,    1935),   pp. 
272-274.  On  June  19,   1914,  a  document  was  issued  called  the  Ratification  al  plan  de 
Ayala  in  which  article  three  of  the  Plan  of  Ayala  was  revised  to  exclude  Orozco  from 
leadership  as  a  result  of  his  reactionary  tendencies  in  1912  and  1913.  For  the  complete 
text  see  Manuel  Gonzales  Ramirez,  Planes  politicos  v  otros  documentos  (Mexico,  1954), 
pp.  86-89. 

45.  Herald,  Dec.  5,  1911. 

46.  Ibid.,  Dec.  8,  1911. 

47.  He  was  in  pursuit  of  Antonio  Rojas  who  was  later  to  be  one  of  his  aids.  Ibid., 
Dec.  22,  1911. 

48.  Ibid.,  Jan.  20,  1912. 

49.  Ibid.,  Jan.  31,  1912. 


110  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Revolutionary  sentiments  were  again  strong  in  February, 
1912.  On  February  1,  the  federal  garrison  at  Ciudad  Juarez 
mutinied  and  declared  for  Emilio  Vasquez  Gomez.50  The  agi- 
tation of  Vasquez  Gomez  from  the  United  States  and  the 
inability  of  Madero  to  pacify  the  country  gave  considerable 
support  to  the  revolt.  Orozco  and  his  backers  were  unpre- 
pared for  their  move  and  were  dismayed  when  the  Vasquez 
Gomez  affair  gained  momentum.  The  hacendado  group  had 
not  yet  collected  the  necessary  arms,  ammunition,  or  money 
needed  for  a  successful  revolutionary  enterprise.  Orozco  was 
sent  immediately  to  Ciudad  Juarez  and  was  able  to  quiet  the 
mutiny.  On  February  4,  the  mutineers  were  sent  to  Chihua- 
hua City.51  Orozco  temporized  by  making  terms  with  the  lead- 
ers of  the  mutiny,  and  troops  which  were  moved  from  Ciudad 
Juarez  to  Chihuahua  City  were  to  be  an  important  factor  a 
month  later  when  the  Orozco-hacendado  coalition  was  ready 
to  move. 

All  through  February,  Orozco  hesitated  while  minor  up- 
risings occurred  at  numerous  points  in  Chihuahua  in  favor 
of  Vasquez  Gomez.  On  February  18,  leaders  of  the  Vasquez 
Gomez  movement  tried  to  force  Orozco  into  committing  him- 
self and  his  backers  by  proclaiming  him  General-in-Chief  of 
the  rebel  forces  in  Chihuahua.52  Orozco  still  hesitated,  and  as 
late  as  February  24,  Abraham  Gonzales,  Governor  of  Chi- 
huahua, declared  Orozco  loyal  to  the  government.53  By  March, 
however,  the  Vasquez  Gomez  rebellion  had  gained  such  head- 
way that  there  was  danger  that  Orozco  and  his  supporters 
would  not  be  able  to  control  it. 

On  March  3, 1912,  Orozco  took  the  final  step  and  declared 
himself  against  the  Madero  government,  accepting  the  previ- 
ously offered  position  as  General-in-Chief  of  the  Chihuahua 
rebels.  Supporters  of  Vasquez  Gomez  and  Orozco,  within  the 
state  government,  took  over  the  state  legislature  and  many  of 
the  state  offices.  Francisco  Villa,  remaining  loyal  to  Madero, 
led  federal  troops  against  Chihuahua  City  in  hopes  of  restor- 
ing the  state  government  to  Madero  men.  Orozco,  supported 

50.  Ibid.,  Feb.  2,  1912  ;  Casasola.  I.  422. 

61.  Herald,  Feb.  5,  1912. 

62.  Ibid.,  Feb.  20,  1912. 

63.  76id.,  Feb.  25,  1912. 


OROZCO  111 

by  the  mutineers  from  Ciudad  Juarez,  successfully  defended 
the  state  capital,  driving  Villa  into  the  western  part  of  the 
state. 

Orozco's  defection  brought  on  the  customary  revolution- 
ary plan.  The  plan  was  issued  on  March  25  as  the  Pacto  de  la 
Empacadora  (Plan  Orozquista)  ,54  It  was  more  a  personal 
condemnation  of  Madero  than  a  plan  of  revolution.  It  made 
few  specific  charges  against  the  Madero  government  and  of- 
fered little  in  the  way  of  a  reform  program. 

Orozco  and  his  backers  hoped  their  call  for  revolution 
would  quickly  gain  support  in  other  northern  states.  Soon 
after  issuance  of  the  Plan  Orozquista,  Chihuahua  was  de- 
clared seceded  from  the  Mexican  republic  and  an  invitation 
was  issued  to  other  Mexican  states  to  unite  with  Chihuahua 
to  overthrow  Madero.  None  responded  however,  and  Chi- 
huahua carried  on  the  fight  alone. 

The  Madero  government  found  itself  defenseless.  In  office 
only  a  short  time,  it  had  indifferently  organized  the  affairs 
of  state  and  was  hampered  by  inexperienced  personnel.  Its 
army  was  entirely  disorganized,  the  old  Diaz  organization 
had  not  been  rehabilitated  and  no  new  levies  had  been  made. 
The  most  powerful  military  elements  that  remained  of  the 
rebel  forces  that  had  overthrown  Diaz  were  mostly  in  the 
hands  of  Orozco  in  Chihuahua. 

Orozco  moved  quickly  to  carry  out  his  plan.  He  brought 
together  nearly  five  thousand  men  and  jeeringly  called  upon 
Madero  to  resign  and  save  his  country  more  bloodshed.55  The 
government  sent  against  the  rebels  most  of  its  available 
strength,  some  1,600  men.  They  were  commanded  by  General 
Jose  Gonzales  Salas  who  had  resigned  as  the  Minister  of  War 
in  Madero's  cabinet  to  lead  the  federal  army  in  the  north.66 

A  critical  battle  for  control  of  Chihuahua  developed  early 
in  March  around  Torreon,  an  important  rail  center,  where 
Salas  had  concentrated  his  troops.57  Rebel  forces,  moving 
south  from  Chihuahua  City  along  the  main  line  of  the  Mexi- 
can Central  Railroad,  made  contact  with  federal  outposts  on 

54.  Gonzales  Ramirez,  pp.  95-106. 

55.  National  Archives,  Letcher  to  Bryan,  Chihuahua,  Oct.  17,  1913    (812.00/9484). 

56.  Ibid. 

57.  Herald,  Mar.  9,  1912. 


112  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

March  23,  1912,  at  Rellano,  about  one  hundred  miles  north- 
west of  Torreon.58  On  subsequent  days  the  rebels  advanced 
south  to  Escalon  and  Corralitos.  By  March  27,  the  rebels  were 
completely  victorious.59  This  series  of  victories  plus  success- 
ful operations  in  the  northern  part  of  the  state  gave  Orozco 
control  of  Chihuahua.60 

Although  the  revolution  looked  as  though  it  would  cer- 
tainly succeed,  the  rebels  were  not  to  have  it  so  easy.  The 
federal  army  had  been  defeated  and  scattered,  and  the  road 
to  Mexico  City  was  open  and  undefended.  Panic  gripped  the 
capital  at  the  prospect  of  a  rebel  advance.  A  decision  made  in 
Washington,  D.  C.,  however,  was  to  spell  disaster  for  the  rebel 
cause.  On  March  13,  1912,  the  United  States  government 
placed  an  embargo  on  all  arms  shipments  to  Mexico.61  This 
cut  off  the  rebel  source  of  arms  and  ammunition  and  made  it 
difficult,  if  not  impossible,  for  Orozco  to  quickly  re-supply  his 
army.  Orozco  defended  his  failure  to  follow  up  his  victory  on 
the  basis  of  an  arms  shortage.  The  United  States  arms  em- 
bargo brought  on  bitter  denunciation  by  the  rebels.  Indeed, 
the  Orozco  rebellion  was  characterized  throughout  by  great 
hostility  towards  the  United  States  and  towards  its  citizens 
who  resided  within  territory  held  by  the  rebels.62 

In  early  April,  Madero  prepared  a  second  army  to  send 
against  Orozco.  The  command  of  operations  in  the  north  was 
given  to  Victoriano  Huerta  who  was  given  a  free  hand  in  or- 
ganizing the  force  and  assembled  an  army  of  about  8,000 
men.  These  began  to  move  north  to  Torreon  on  April  10.63  A 
month  later  Huerta  was  ready  to  begin  operations  against 
Orozco's  forces. 

Early  in  May  a  major  split  appeared  among  the  leaders 
of  the  rebellion.  Emilio  Vasquez  Gomez  entered  Mexico  at 
Ciudad  Juarez  on  May  3,  and  on  the  following  day  declared 
himself  Provisional  President  and  leader  of  the  revolution.64 
Orozco  refused  to  recognize  the  provisional  government  es- 

58.  Ibid.,  Mar.  24,  1912. 

59.  Ibid.,  Mar.  28,  1912. 

60.  In  the  north,  Ciudad  Juarez  fell  to  the  rebels  on  Feb.  24.  Ibid.,  Feb.  27,  1912. 

61.  Ibid.,  Mar.  14,  1912. 

62.  National  Archives,  Letcher  to  Bryan,  Chihuahua,  Oct.  17,  1913    (812.00/9484). 

63.  Ibid.;  Herald,  April  11,  1912 ;  Casasola,  I,  443. 

64.  Herald,  May  5,  1912. 


OROZCO  113 

tablished  and  went  so  far  as  to  have  Vasquez  Gomez  arrested 
and  later  expelled  from  Mexico.65  Orozco  and  his  backers 
were  now  in  complete  control,  but  they  were  to  find  that  the 
treatment  of  Vasquez  Gomez  and  the  very  apparent  reaction- 
ary course  of  the  revolution  would  soon  alienate  all  but  the 
staunchest  of  Orozco's  followers. 

In  the  meantime,  Huerta  launched  a  series  of  attacks  that 
gradually  forced  the  rebels  north  and  would  eventually  de- 
stroy them  as  an  effective  army.  Orozco  was  still  short  of  sup- 
plies and  his  forces  faced  a  numerically  superior  foe.  Also, 
his  break  with  Vasquez  Gomez  had  lowered  the  morale  of 
many  of  his  followers  who  had  earlier  supported  the  deposed 
presidential  aspirant.  On  May  10, 1912,  fighting  broke  out  at 
Conejos,  about  forty  miles  northwest  of  Torreon  on  the  Mex- 
ican Central  Railroad,  which  resulted  in  a  victory  for 
Huerta.66  Federal  troops  continued  to  advance  along  the  rail- 
road and  on  May  22  and  23  fought  a  pitched  battle  at  Rellano 
and  again  defeated  the  rebels.67  From  Rellano,  Orozco  re- 
treated north  to  Bachimba,  destroying  the  railroad  as  he 
went.  It  took  Huerta's  work  crews  and  army  until  July  3  to 
repair  the  rails  and  to  move  into  position  for  an  assault  on 
Orozco's  defenses.  The  battle  of  Bachimba  was  fought  on 
July  3 ;  and  on  July  4,  Orozco's  forces  were  in  full  retreat 
toward  Chihuahua  City.  The  revolutionary  forces  were  dis- 
banded as  an  organized  army  on  July  7,  when  Huerta  reached 
Chihuahua  City. 

When  he  disbanded  his  army  Orozco  gave  orders  for  gue- 
rrilla warfare.68  He  admitted  defeat  but  was  determined  to 
continue  fighting.  On  July  12,  he  delivered  a  final  diatribe 
against  Madero  through  the  newspapers.  It  was  a  weak  ef- 
fort to  gain  sympathy  and  support,  and  it  failed.69 

Huerta  established  his  headquarters  at  Chihuahua  City 
but  made  little  effort  to  stop  the  guerrilla  bands  that  ravaged 
the  country.  Orozco  made  his  headquarters  at  Ciudad  Juarez. 
There  is  some  evidence  that  the  federal  armies  in  the  north 


65.  Ibid.,  May  8,  1912. 

66.  Ibid.,  May  11,  1912. 

67.  Ibid..  May  24,  1912. 

68.  National  Archives,  Letcher  to  Bryan,  Chihuahua,  Oct.  17,  1913    (812.00/9484). 

69.  Herald,  July  13,  1912. 


114  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

were  not  wholly  unsympathetic  to  the  rebel  cause,  and  that 
Orozco  and  Huerta  were  in  touch  and  knew  of  each  other's 
plans.  It  is  not  surprising  that  Huerta,  allied  by  almost  life 
long  association  and  community  of  interest  with  Diaz,  should 
be  a  foe  of  the  new  regime  in  Mexico  City.  There  was  much 
talk  in  Chihuahua  among  the  army  people  that  General 
Huerta  was  planning  to  turn  against  Madero.  Whether  or 
not  it  was  true  that  he  was  plotting  such  a  revolt  at  this  time, 
it  was  true  that  he  was  inactive  in  suppressing  completely  the 
Orozco  rebellion,  though  all  means  possible  had  been  placed 
at  his  command.  His  facilities  even  included  two  airplanes 
along  with  trained  pilots  and  mechanics.  The  planes  were 
never  taken  from  their  hangars.70 

Orozco  retained  control  of  Ciudad  Juarez  without  serious 
interference  from  Huerta  and  continued  his  fight  against 
Madero.  The  biggest  threat  he  was  able  to  bring  against  the 
Madero  government  was  the  persecution  of  foreigners  and 
their  property.  He  issued  orders  that  all  foreigners  must  give 
up  their  arms  or  join  his  revolution,  and  he  withdrew  all 
guarantees  for  the  protection  of  foreign  interests.71  These 
moves  had  little  effect,  for  Orozco's  power  had  waned  and  he 
controlled  only  a  small  territory.  On  August  16, 1912,  Orozco 
abandoned  Ciudad  Juarez.72 

The  series  of  military  defeats  between  May  10,  1912,  and 
the  abandonment  of  Ciudad  Juarez  caused  major  dissension 
in  the  ranks  of  Orozco's  followers  and  dissatisfaction  on  the 
part  of  his  backers.  On  July  10,  there  was  a  movement  to 
depose  Orozco  as  revolutionary  leader  in  favor  of  Vasquez 
Gomez  and  David  de  la  Fuente.73  De  la  Fuente  was  to  take 
over  as  military  commander  and  Vasquez  Gomez  as  political 
leader.74  On  July  17,  Antonio  Rojas  demanded  that  Orozco 
give  up  the  funds  he  had  accumulated  during  the  revolution 
and  also  relinquish  leadership  of  the  movement.75  The 

70.  National  Archives,  Letcher  to  Bryan,  Chihuahua,  Oct.  17,  1913   (812.00/9484)  ; 
for  a  short  history  of  early  aviation  in  Mexico  see  Dorote  Negrete,  Cronologio  areontM- 
tica  de  Mexico  (n.p.,  192-) ,  passim. 

71.  Herald,  July  30,  1912. 

72.  Ibid.,  Aug.  17,  1917  ;  Casasola,  I.  466. 

73.  National  Archives,  Memorandum,  unaddressed,  unsigned,  July  8,  1912   (812.00/ 
7956). 

74.  Herald,  July  11  and  12,  1912. 

75.  Ibid.,  July  18,  1912. 


OROZCO  115 

Church,  the  cientificos,  and  many  of  the  hacendados  of  Chi- 
huahua had  abandoned  Orozco  in  July  when  it  was  obvious 
that  Huerta  was  going  to  defeat  him.  By  late  July  much  of 
his  army  had  deserted  and  leadership  of  the  main  revolution- 
ary forces  in  Chihuahua  passed  into  other  hands.76 

Orozco's  activities  during  the  last  half  of  1912  were  con- 
fined to  small  guerrilla  raids  and  spiteful  reprisals  against 
foreigners,  particularly  United  States  nationals.  On  Septem- 
ber 13,  1912,  he  captured  Ojinaga  which  remained  his  head- 
quarters until  January,  1913.77  Here  again  the  position  of 
the  federal  armies  in  Chihuahua  was  shown.  Orozco,  during 
these  last  months  of  1912,  had  only  about  800  poorly  armed, 
untrained  men,  and  these  were  fast  dwindling,  yet  he  was 
able  to  hold  Ojinaga  and  to  pillage  northern  Chihuahua  with 
little  interference  from  federal  troops.78  In  January,  1913, 
his  army  all  but  gone,  Orozco  gave  up  his  fight  and  entered 
the  United  States.  He  was  apparently  aware,  however,  that  a 
bigger  revolution  was  near  at  hand. 

On  January  25, 1913,  Orozco,  in  exile  in  the  United  States, 
published  a  formal  statement  again  calling  for  the  resigna- 
tion of  Madero.  The  statement  also  suggested  a  provisional 
government:  President,  Jeronimo  Trevifio;  Foreign  Minis- 
ter, Francisco  de  la  Barra ;  Treasury,  Toribio  Esquivel  Obre- 
gon ;  Communications,  Felix  Diaz ;  Public  Instruction,  Fran- 
cisco Vasquez  Gomez.  The  statement  closed  "Pascual  Orozco 
declines  any  benefit."79  This  was  the  final  gesture  of  Orozco's 
revolution  against  Madero.  In  February  the  Reyes-Felix  Diaz 
revolt  took  precedence,  and  on  February  15,  Orozco  declared 
himself  for  that  group.80 

Orozco's  rebellion  in  Chihuahua,  though  unsuccessful,  did 
much  to  bring  down  the  Madero  government.  To  accomplish 
stability  and  consolidate  his  government,  Madero  needed 
peace  and  money.  In  July,  1911,  the  Mexican  Treasury  had  a 
surplus  of  63,000,000  pesos.81  A  large  portion  of  this  disap- 
peared to  support  federal  forces  in  Chihuahua.  Disturbances 

76.  Ibid.,  July  25,  1912. 

77.  Ibid.,  Sept.  4,  1912. 

78.  National  Archives,  Letcher  to  Bryan,  Chihuahua,  Oct.  17,  1913    (812.00/9484). 

79.  Herald,  Jan.  28,  1913  ;  NYT,  Feb.  10,  1913. 

80.  Herald,  Feb.  16,  1913. 

81.  Ibid.,  July  8,  1911. 


116  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

in  all  parts  of  Mexico  told  heavily  on  the  central  government, 
but  Chihuahua  became  the  focus  of  effort.  Lack  of  funds  made 
it  impossible  for  Madero  to  put  into  effect  the  demands  for 
reform,  and  dissatisfaction  with  his  inability  to  deal  with 
rebellion  cost  him  support  and  made  him  vulnerable  to  the 
machinations  of  Huerta,  Reyes  and  Felix  Diaz.  Although 
Orozco  had  no  personal  part  in  the  coup  d'etat  which  brought 
Huerta  to  power,  it  can  be  said  that  Huerta  inherited  Orozco's 
revolution  and  did  in  another  way  what  Orozco  could  not  ac- 
complish on  his  own.  The  same  elements  that  had  supported 
Orozco  in  1912  backed  Huerta. 

The  ascendancy  of  Huerta  brought  Orozco  scurrying  back 
to  Mexico.  He  was  met  by  Huerta  and,  after  the  customary 
abrazos,  Huerta  appointed  Orozco  as  a  brigadier-general  in 
the  Mexican  army  for  his  service  to  his  country  in  trying  to 
overthrow  Madero.82  Huerta,  following  his  "election,"  issued 
an  invitation  to  all  the  state  leaders  to  support  his  govern- 
ment. In  the  north  the  invitation  was  rejected  by  most  men 
when  it  became  known  that  Carranza  intended  to  oppose 
Huerta.  Orozco  was  among  the  few  who  accepted.  The  Ca- 
rranza forces  revolted. 

Orozco  became  the  workhorse  among  Huerta's  generals  in 
northern  Mexico.  From  July,  1913,  until  the  fall  of  Huerta  a 
year  later,  Orozco  was  the  most  persistent  in  fighting  the 
rebel  advance.  Though  a  federal  commander,  his  troops  were 
usually  irregulars,  made  up  of  his  personal  followers  who  had 
remained  loyal  to  him  since  1910.  Federal  strongholds  were 
at  Chihuahua  City,  Ciudad  Juarez,  Ojinaga  and  Torre6n. 
The  rebel  army  was  concentrated  in  southern  Chihuahua  and 
was  commanded  by  Orozco's  one  time  aide,  Francisco  Villa. 
Until  October,  1913,  neither  force  was  able  to  gain  any  real 
advantage. 

Late  in  1913,  Villa  began  operations  to  clear  Chihuahua 
of  federal  troops.  In  October  he  broke  federal  power  at 
Torredn  which  severed  the  last  connection  between  the  Mex- 
ican capital  and  the  federal  forces  in  Chihuahua.  Villa's  next 
objective  became  Chihuahua  City,  but  Orozco  and  his  irregu- 


82.  National  Archives,  Letcher  to  Bryan,  Chihuahua,  Oct.  17,  1913    (812.00/9484)  ; 
Casasola,  II,  527. 


OROZCO  117 

lars  proved  the  balance  of  power  and  Villa  was  repulsed  by 
the  federal  troops.  Rather  than  return  south,  Villa  by-passed 
Chihuahua  City  and  on  November  15  succeeded  in  taking 
Ciudad  Juarez.  Villa  began  an  advance  south  November  24, 
capturing  Tierra  Blanca.  Orozco  moved  out  of  Chihuahua 
City  to  halt  the  rebel  advance,  but  was  driven  back.83  With  the 
rebels  controlling  the  railroads  both  north  and  south,  federal 
forces  abandoned  Chihuahua  City  on  December  3.84  Orozco's 
forces  and  those  from  Chihuahua  City  retreated  to  Ojinaga.85 
Villa  closely  pursued  the  federals  to  Ojinaga,  and  on  January 
10, 1914,  drove  them  into  the  United  States.  Most  of  the  offi- 
cers and  men  were  interned,  but  Orozco  escaped  and  soon 
organized  another  command  to  fight  the  rebels  in  northern 
Mexico.86 

During  the  first  six  months  of  1914  Orozco's  activities 
were  difficult  to  trace,  for  he  was  constantly  on  the  move. 
Being  thoroughly  familiar  with  the  border,  he  slipped  in  and 
out  of  Mexico  at  will.  He  is  known  to  have  lived  for  months 
within  a  short  distance  of  El  Paso,  Texas.  In  May  he  showed 
up  briefly  in  Los  Angeles  where  he  tried  to  recruit  men  and 
supplies  for  the  Huerta  cause.  He  fled  Los  Angeles  when  a 
warrant  was  issued  for  his  arrest  on  a  charge  of  violating 
United  States  neutrality  laws.87  In  June  Orozco  was  back  in 
Mexico  in  command  of  4,000  irregulars ;  his  orders  were  to 
support  the  federal  garrison  at  Zacatecas.  The  Carranza 
rebels  soundly  defeated  the  federal  garrison.  Orozco,  not 
wanting  to  risk  his  small  force  in  the  fight,  retreated  to  Sole- 
dad  where  the  rebel  cavalry  caught  up  with  and  surrounded 
him.88  He  escaped  their  trap  and  in  late  June  joined  other 
Huerta  leaders  at  San  Luis  Potosi  where  they  declared  them- 
selves separated  from  the  control  of  the  regular  army  but  at 
the  same  time  pledged  that  they  would  continue  to  fight  the 
Constitutional  Army  led  by  Carranza.89 

83.  NYT,  Nov.  30,  1913. 

84.  Casasola,  II,  654 ;  Juan  Barragan  Rodriguez,  Historic,  del  ejtrcito  y  dc  la.  revo- 
lucion  constitucionalista  (Mexico,  1946),  2  vols.,  II,  654. 

85.  NYT,  Dec.  10,  1913. 

86.  Ibid,,  Sept.  1,  1915 ;  Barragan,  p.  282. 

87.  NYT,  May  13,  1914. 

88.  Ibid.,  June  27,  1914. 

89.  Ibid.,  June  29,  1914. 


118  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

By  July  it  was  evident  the  Huerta  regime  was  fast  com- 
ing to  an  end.  Rebel  forces  under  Carranza  were  closing  on 
Mexico  City,  Villa  had  all  but  complete  control  in  the  north. 
On  July  15, 1914,  Huerta  gave  up  and  left  the  country,  going 
to  Spain. 

Orozco,  without  waiting  for  a  Carranza  government  to 
come  into  full  control,  started  a  counter-revolution.  His  chief 
aide  was  Francisco  Cardenas,  the  officer  who  had  commanded 
the  guard  that  had  custody  of  Madero  when  he  was  mur- 
dered.90 The  counter-revolution  was  never  to  be  a  serious 
threat  to  either  Villa  or  Carranza,  who  themselves  split  in 
1914  and  were  fighting  each  other.  Orozco's  activities  were 
confined  to  minor  clashes  with  Villa  forces  in  northern  Mex- 
ico. He  moved  freely  across  the  border  and  was  wanted  by 
Villa  in  Mexico  and  authorities  in  the  United  States.  In  De- 
cember, Orozco  appeared  for  a  short  time  in  New  York  City, 
seeking  arms  and  financial  aid  for  his  fight  against  Carranza 
and  Villa.91 

While  Orozco  was  carrying  on  his  lone  fight,  Huerta  had 
returned  from  exile  in  Spain  and  was  in  the  United  States 
plotting  his  return  to  power.  He  and  Orozco  joined  forces  and 
on  June  27, 1915,  met  at  Newman,  New  Mexico,  near  El  Paso. 
They  were  immediately  arrested  by  American  immigration 
officers  for  violation  of  United  States  neutrality  laws.  Appar- 
ently Orozco  and  Huerta  planned  to  cross  the  border  where 
loyal  forces  were  waiting  to  revolt.  It  was  also  reported  that 
a  substantial  quantity  of  arms  was  waiting  for  the  rebels  in 
a  warehouse  in  El  Paso.92 

This  was  not  to  be  the  end  of  Orozco's  activities,  but  it 
was  the  finish  of  Huerta.  On  July  2,  Orozco  jumped  his  bail 
of  $7,500  and  entered  Mexico.  Huerta  was  arrested  before 
he  could  do  likewise  and  was  held  in  an  El  Paso  jail.93  A  short 
time  later  Huerta  was  killed  by  another  prisoner  while  still 
in  jail. 

During  the  remainder  of  July  and  in  August,  1915,  Orozco 
and  a  few  loyal  followers  operated  along  the  border  trying  to 

90.  Ibid.,  July  19,  1914. 

91.  Ibid.,  Dec.  15,  1914. 

92.  Ibid.,  June  28,  1916. 

93.  Ibid.,  July  3  and  13,  1915. 


OROZCO  119 

gather  an  army,  but  with  little  success.  To  support  them- 
selves they  raided  ranches  on  both  sides  of  the  border.  On 
August  31,  Orozco  raided  the  Dick  Love  Ranch  in  the  Big 
Bend  district  of  Texas.  A  posse  of  civilians,  United  States 
customs  officials,  and  members  of  the  13th  United  States  Cav- 
alry were  close  at  hand  and  took  his  trail.  In  the  Green  River 
Canyon  of  the  High  Lonesome  Mountains  near  Hillsburg, 
Texas,  Pascual  Orozco  and  four  of  his  companions  were  killed 
in  a  running  fight.94  Orozco  had  fallen  a  long  way  since  his 
triumphant  entry  into  Chihuahua  City  as  general  of  the  revo- 
lutionary army  that  had  beaten  Diaz  in  1911. 

Orozco  was  an  opportunist ;  the  satisfaction  of  his  ambi- 
tions for  wealth  and  prestige  determined  his  loyalties.  He 
thrived  on  the  brutality,  lawlessness,  and  coarseness  of  gue- 
rrilla fighting.  For  all  his  shortcomings  his  appeal  to  the  peo- 
ple of  Chihuahua  was  remarkable.  Even  in  defeat,  disgraced 
in  the  eyes  of  most  Mexicans,  and  declared  a  bandit  by  two  na- 
tions, Orozco  was  still  able  to  raise  an  army  in  Chihuahua 
with  relative  ease.  In  the  annals  of  Chihuahua  history  he  re- 
mains a  hero  to  this  day,  particularly  for  his  part  in  the  over- 
throw of  Diaz. 

His  services  to  the  revolution  in  1910-1911,  when  the  Diaz 
forces  were  defeated,  were  second  only  to  those  of  Madero, 
and  perhaps  in  some  respects  he  takes  precedence  over  the 
"Apostle  of  the  Revolution."  The  remaining  years  of  his  life 
are  not  so  deserving  of  praise.  After  the  fall  of  Diaz,  Orozco's 
name  and  abilities  became  permanently  associated  with  all 
the  elements  in  Mexico  that  stood  for  the  old  tyranny  and 
the  old  ways  of  doing  things.  Until  the  day  he  died  he  kept  the 
northern  states,  and  particularly  Chihuahua,  in  a  state  of 
turmoil.  Forces  that  were  eventually  welded  to  crush  him  and 
others  like  him  were  also  strong  enough  to  bring  a  degree  of 
stability  and  sanity  to  the  Mexican  nation.  The  leaders  of  this 
new  force  emerged  the  victors  over  the  more  reactionary  and 
anti-revolution  elements. 

In  all  parts  of  Mexico  in  1910  men  like  Pascual  Orozco 
burst  suddenly  upon  the  Mexican  scene.  The  chance  for  lead- 

94.  National  Archives,  Weekly  Report,  Headquarters,  Southern  Department,  Fort 
Sam  Houston,  Texas,  Dept.  3,  1915 ;  NYT,  Sept.  1,  1915. 


120  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ership,  recognition,  and  even  wealth  was  there  for  the  strong 
to  take.  It  was  a  period  of  particular  brutality  and  inhuman- 
ity. To  survive  the  rigors  of  leadership  a  man  had  to  be  cast 
in  the  pattern  of  an  Orozco  or  a  Villa  or  a  Zapata.  It  was  not 
until  the  Mexican  nation  was  exhausted  and  prostrate  that 
any  semblance  of  order  or  of  law  developed. 

Until  the  many  state  and  local  leaders  who  participated 
in  the  great  rebellion,  from  1910  to  1917,  are  sorted  out  and 
analyzed,  our  knowledge  of  the  Mexican  movement  will  be 
inadequate  and  faulty.  The  Mexican  Constitution  of  1917, 
which  has  had  such  an  important  impact  upon  the  constitu- 
tional development  of  all  of  the  Latin  American  countries, 
was  a  direct  outgrowth  of  the  Diaz  dictatorship  and  the  cha- 
otic six  years  that  followed  his  fall.  The  developing  revolu- 
tion with  all  of  its  ramifications  also  grew  out  of  the  anarchy 
and  bloodshed  that  swept  Mexico  from  1910  to  1917.  It  is 
essential  that  the  basic  elements  that  went  into  the  making 
of  Mexican  history  during  these  six  or  seven  years  be  under- 
stood. The  activities  of  Pascual  Orozco,  Jr.,  and  his  Chihua- 
hua rebels  were  but  one  link  in  that  chain  of  events. 

[NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW,  VoL  36,  No.  2.  April.  1961] 


BRITISH  INVESTMENT  AND  THE  AMERICAN 
MINING  FRONTIER,  1860-1914 

By  CLARK  C.  SPENCE* 

*  *  T7  NGLAND  is  a  lake  of  money,  bank  full  and  running  over." 
JLj  So  wrote  the  San  Francisco  editor  of  the  Mining  and 
Scientific  Press  in  1895.1  Many  fellow  Americans  were  in- 
clined to  agree  and  undoubtedly  the  relatively  heavy  invest- 
ments of  British  capital  that  had  already  splashed  over  into 
the  West  had  much  to  do  with  creating  this  attitude.  Although 
the  pound  sterling  was  attracted  to  many  types  of  enterprises 
— vineyards,  railroads,  and  ranching  among  others — be- 
tween 1860  and  1914  at  least  584  joint-stock  companies,  with 
a  total  nominal  capitalization  of  not  less  than  £81,185,000, 
were  registered  with  the  Board  of  Trade  in  Great  Britain  to 
engage  in  mining  or  milling  activities  in  the  intermountan 
West  and  Southwest,  exclusive  of  the  Pacific  Coast  proper. 
Of  these,  probably  not  more  than  329,  capitalized  at  about 
£46,000,000,  ever  raised  funds  and  actually  commenced  oper- 
ations. Of  the  total,  at  least  79,  representing  nominal  capital 
of  £10,997,200,  were  formed  to  work  property  in  Arizona  and 
New  Mexico,  although  about  20  per  cent  of  this  number  never 
became  operational,  even  for  a  limited  period  of  time.2 

Such  figures  must  be  approached  gingerly.  Often  the  gap 
between  nominal  and  actual  capital  was  a  wide  one.  The 
British  public  might  fail  to  respond,  with  the  result  that 
part  of  the  nominal  capital  remained  unsubscribed;  large 
blocks  of  shares  might  be  granted  fully  paid  to  vendors  in 
full  or  partial  payment  for  property ;  sometimes  non-British 
shareholders — American  or  Continental — accounted  for  a 


*  Associate  Professor  of  History,   The  Pennsylvania  State  University,   University 
Park,  Penn. 

1.  Mining  and  Scientific  Press,  LXXI  (Sept.  21,  1895),  185. 

2.  These  and   other   figures    concerning   the   organization   and   operation    of   these 
584  joint-stock  companies  have  been  compiled  by  the  writer  primarily  from  official  files 
located  in   the  offices   of  the  Registrar  of   Companies,   Board   of  Trade,   Bush   House, 
London,  and  the  Queen's  Remembrancer,  Parliament  Square,   Edinburgh.  In  addition, 
much  pertinent  material  has  been  used  from  collections  in  the  archives  of  the  Stock 
Exchange,  Share  and  Loan  Department,  London. 


121 


122  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

proportion  of  the  subscribed  capital.3  Certainly  the  heavy 
expenses  of  floating  a  joint-stock  company  in  London  or  Edin- 
burgh might  absorb  a  sizable  amount  of  the  original  assets. 
In  one  extreme  instance,  for  example,  approximately  £120,- 
000  ($600,000)  was  spent  in  organizing  and  sustaining  a  sin- 
gle Anglo-Utah  concern  during  its  early  months  of  activity.4 
On  the  other  hand,  these  general  figures — and,  indeed, 
this  paper — are  concerned  with  only  part  of  the  story  of  Brit- 
ish investment  in  western  mines.  Undoubtedly  much  capital 
cannot  be  pinpointed.  Until  late  in  the  century  English  rec- 
ords gave  no  indication  of  additional  capital  raised  through 
mortgage  indebtedness.  Thus,  while  in  mid-1888  the  Arizona 
Copper  Company,  Ltd.,  listed  a  nominal  capital  of  only  £715,- 
000,  it  had  issued  £266,000  worth  of  unrecorded  debentures 
through  a  kindred  firm  in  order  to  meet  its  obligations  and 
to  conduct  operations.5  The  picture  is  further  complicated  by 
indeterminable  amounts  invested  through  unincorporated 
partnerships  or  friendly  societies  and,  more  importantly, 
through  American  companies.  Of  the  latter,  like  the  Seven 
Stars  Gold  Mining  Company  or  the  White  Hills  Mining  and 
Milling  Company  (both  in  Arizona)  ,6  there  were  many.  They 
hawked  their  shares  or  bonds  on  the  British  market  and 
sometimes  worked  extensively  in  the  West,  but  few  have  left 
behind  them  records  to  indicate  how  many  shares  were  held 

8.  For  examples  of  Southwestern  companies  illustrating  this  discrepancy  between 
nominal  and  actual  capital  see :  Jersey  Lily  Gold  Mines,  Ltd.,  Summary  or  Capital  and 
Shares  to  February  14,  1899,  located  in  the  Board  of  Trade  flies,  office  of  the  Registrar 
of  Companies,  Bush  House  London.  File  No.  45507.  (Such  files  are  cited  hereafter  as 
C.R.O.  and  number.  Numbers  preceded  by  the  letter  "B"  are  on  microfilm  at  the  Ban- 
croft Library.)  ;  Grand  Central  Silver  Mines,  Ltd.,  Summary  of  Capital  and  Shares  to 
February  10,  1892,  C.R.O.  B34882  ;  Little  Wonder  Gold  Mines,  Ltd.,  Prospectus  (April 
12,  1901),  C.R.O.  B69138.  The  roster  of  the  Morenci  Copper  Mines,  Ltd.,  an  Anglo- 
Arizona  undertaking  of  1899,  shows  shares  held  not  only  in  England,  but  also  in  France, 
Germany,  Holland,  Italy,  Switzerland,  Portugal,  Corsica,  and  Turkey.  Morenci  Copper 
Mines,  Ltd.,  Summary  of  Capital  and  Shares  to  January  11,  1901,  C.R.O.  62248. 

4.  Trenor  W."*Park  testimony    (April  19,  1876),  Emma  Mine  Investigation,  House 
Report  No.  579,  44th  Congress,  1st  Session  (1875-1876),  758. 

5.  The  Statist,  XXII   (Sept.  22,  1888),  386;  Arizona  Copper  Company,  Ltd.,  Pros- 
pectus (1888).  This  was  a  prospectus  advertising  the  issuance  of  the  £266,000  perpetual 
debentures  six  years  after  the  organization  of  the  concern.  Unless  otherwise  noted,  all 
company  prospectuses  cited  are  located  in  the  Stock  Exchange  archives,  London. 

6.  For  the  White  Hills  Mining  and  Milling  Company,  which  had  heavy  Manchester 
backing,  see  the  Anglo-Colorado  Mining  and  Milling  Guide  (London),  I  (June  25,  1898), 
67 ;  Mohave  County  Miner,  Feb.  11,  1921.  The  Seven  Stars  Gold  Mining  Company  and  its 
activities  during  the  1890's  is  amply  covered  in  Wiser,  et  al.,  v.  Lawler,  ct  al.,  189  U.S. 
Reports  (1902),  261-274. 


BRITISH   MINING  123 

in  English  hands.  In  any  event,  because  of  the  imponderables, 
any  attempt  at  quantitative  analysis  falls  far  short  of  its 
mark. 

But  whatever  its  extent  and  through  whatever  its  media, 
the  flow  of  investment  into  western  mines  was  but  part  of  a 
much  broader  movement  of  British  capital  into  all  corners  of 
the  mineral  world,  ranging  from  Aruba  to  the  Yukon,  from 
Coolgardie  to  Zanzibar.  The  American  West  was  not  pe- 
culiarly favored;  competing  with  other  regions  it  received 
only  a  fraction  of  British  overseas  capital.  In  1890  only  17.1 
per  cent  of  all  new  capital  offered  by  mining  concerns  regis- 
tered in  England  was  destined  for  any  part  of  the  United 
States ;  probably  about  3.5  per  cent  of  similar  capital  offered 
in  1900  was  earmarked  specifically  for  the  American  West.7 
And  British  investments  made  up  only  a  small  portion  of  the 
total  capital  that  developed  western  mineral  industries.  Frag- 
mentary figures  show  that  in  1895,  for  example,  British  joint- 
stock  capital  represented  about  1.5  per  cent  of  all  new  capital 
nominally  registered  for  Colorado  mines  in  that  year.8 

After  a  brief  and  unhappy  experience  in  California  dur- 
ing the  1850's,  English  investments  were  not  especially  no- 
ticeable in  western  mines  until  after  1870.  The  confusion  and 
uncertainty  fostered  by  the  Civil  War  acted  as  a  deterrent, 
as  did  the  condition  of  the  mineral  industry  itself.  Depression 
struck  in  the  mid-sixties,  as  Eastern  companies  succumbed 
to  "process  mania"  and  installed  fantastic  new  contraptions 
for  "frying,  roasting  or  stewing  precious  ores"  which  had 
been  devised  by  so-called  "experts"  who  knew  "as  little  about 
practical  milling  as  the  lunatic  in  Swift  did  about  extracting 
sunbeams  from  cucumbers."9  The  resulting  costly  and  spec- 
tacular failures  by  many  American  firms  could  not  help  but 

7.  Walter  R.  Skinner  (ed.),  The  Mining  Manual  (London,  1891-1892),  xi ;  Mining 
Journal  (London),  Jan.  19,  1901,  71. 

8.  According  to  the  British  Vice-Consul  in  Denver,  there  were  632  mining  com- 
panies registered  and  incorporated  in  Colorado  in  1895  with  a  total  capital  of  nearly 
£108,000,000  on  paper.  United  States  Report  for  the  Year  1895  on  the  Trade  of  the 
Consular  District  of  Chicago,  Foreign  Office,  Annual  Series  No.  1725   (1896),  30-31.  The 
writer  unearthed  twelve  British  joint-stock  companies  with  a  total  nominal  capital  of 
£1,349,000  registered  to  exploit  mineral  resources  in  Colorado  in  1895. 

9.  Amasa  McCoy,  Mines  and  Mining  in  Colorado:  a  Conversational  Lecture,  Deliv- 
ered in  the  Lecture  Room  of  Crosby's  Opera  House,  to  the  International  Mining  and 
Exchange  Company  (Chicago,  1871),  35. 


124  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

leave  the  British  public  cool  to  western  investment  schemes. 

Moreover,  British  capital  had  a  tendency  to  lag  until  some 
semblance  of  "civilization"  became  apparent  in  the  West.  It 
tended  to  move  more  readily,  for  example,  into  regions  where 
the  Indians  provided  the  least  trouble  and  where  railroads 
were  early  available.  Thus  Nevada,  Colorado,  and  Utah  were 
favored  with  overseas  capital  at  an  earlier  date  than  Idaho, 
Montana,  New  Mexico,  and  Arizona.  From  1860  to  1873  there 
were  thirty-three  British  concerns  organized  to  operate 
mines  in  Nevada,  twenty-two  for  Colorado,  but  only  three 
for  Arizona  and  none  for  New  Mexico. 

In  general  the  decade  of  the  sixties  brought  only  limited 
British  investment  (actually  sixteen  companies,  with  a  total 
capitalization  of  £1,525,000) ,  but  the  stage  was  being  set  for 
a  more  substantial  flow.  English  company  laws  had  by  1862 
simplified  the  organization  of  the  joint-stock  company  and 
had  added  limited  liability  to  its  advantage.  At  the  same  time, 
a  generally  prosperous  investing  public  was  being  brought  in 
contact  with  western  opportunities.  Innumerable  British 
travelers  bent  on  sport  or  adventure  carried  home  tales  of 
mineral  riches  in  the  Rockies  or  beyond ;  thousands  of  Brit- 
ish emigrants  in  the  West  retained  family  or  business  ties 
abroad ;  English  or  Cornish  experts  sent  to  inspect  or  manage 
American  mines  undoubtedly  served  as  important  links.  Se- 
lected ores  shipped  to  international  exhibitions  or  to  Swansea 
or  Liverpool  to  take  advantage  of  superior  refining  methods 
gave  mute  if  misleading  testimony  of  western  wealth.10  And 
all  the  while,  by  newspaper  and  periodical,  by  pamphlet, 
broadside,  and  prospectus,  promoters  constantly  kept  "op- 
portunity" before  the  British  public.11 

In  the  early  1870's  came  a  speculative  flurry  which  fo- 
cused attention  sharply  on  Colorado,  Nevada,  and  Utah.  In 
spite  of  momentary  scares  emanating  from  the  confusion  of 

10.  Mining  Journal,  March  12,  1864;  Colorado  Miner  (Georgetown),  Dec.  14,  1871. 

11.  A  typical  promotional  pamphlet  is  Lincoln  Vanderbilt's  The  New  and  Wonder- 
ful Explorations  of  Professor  Lincoln  Vanderbilt,  the  Great  American  Traveller,  in  the 
Territories  of  Colorado,  Arizona,  &  Utah,  and  the  States  of  California,  Nevada,  &  Texas, 
Adapted  for  the  Emigrants,  Settlers,  Mine  Speculators,  Fortune  Hunters,  and  Travellers 
(London,   1870).  As  for  Arizona,   wrote  Vanderbilt,   "Nowhere  in   the  world  is  there 
such  a  rich  section  of  country  for  mining,  and  favourable  facilities  for  working  these 
wonderfully  productive  mines,  as  embraced  in  an  area  of  40  miles  square,  lying  east  and 
south  of  the  town  of  Prescott."  (pp.  32-33) 


BRITISH   MINING  125 

the  Franco-Prussian  War  and  the  Alabama  claims  question,12 
the  year  1871  produced  a  bumper  crop  of  Anglo-American 
mining  companies — a  total  of  thirty-four,  capitalized  nom- 
inally at  £4,550,000,  of  which  twenty,  with  a  capital  of 
£3,211,000,  actually  operated.  The  boom  leveled  out  in  1872 
and  1873,  then  fell  off  sharply  as  the  cold  wind  of  depression 
swept  across  the  West,  chilling  the  ardor  of  the  investor  and 
leaving  in  its  wake  a  mass  of  corporate  wreckage.13  At  pre- 
cisely the  same  time  English  faith  was  being  severely  shaken 
by  exposures  relating  to  the  Emma  Silver  Mining  Company, 
Ltd.,  a  concern  whose  name  to  the  average  Englishman  be- 
came synonymous  with  Yankee  skulduggery.  Partly  because 
of  promotional  support  given  by  the  American  minister  in 
London,  British  investors  had  succumbed  to  the  wiles  of  the 
seductive  Emma  and  had  plunged  £1,000,000  into  this  Utah 
endeavor,  only  to  discover — too  late — that  the  property  was 
worked  out.14  This  revelation  brought  not  only  Utah,  but  the 
entire  West  into  disrepute,  as  a  combination  of  elements — 
depression  and  distrust — brought  lean  years  of  investments. 
Only  fifteen  new  Anglo- western  concerns  (one  of  them  in 
Arizona)  came  into  active  existence  during  the  seven  years 
from  1873  to  1880,  and  their  total  capital  was  only  £1,546,000 
— about  forty-eight  per  cent  of  the  total  for  the  single  year 
1871. 

Stiff  competition  from  the  booming  new  Indian  fields  and 
a  mild  financial  crisis  in  1878  did  nothing  to  relieve  the  situa- 
tion, but  except  for  a  sharp  downward  trend  in  1880  and 
again  in  1885,  the  eighties  brought  a  general  increase,  the 
year  1886  being  the  best  since  1871 ;  1887  and  1888  were  the 
two  peak  years  of  the  entire  period,  for  at  least  thirty  com- 
panies (six  of  them  in  Arizona)  with  a  total  nominal  capital 

12.  Hiram  A.  Johnson  to  Henry  M.  Teller   (London,  Feb.  19,  1872),  Teller  MSS ; 
William  Byers  to  A.  E.  Langford   (n.p.,  Sept.  23,  1870),  Byers  Letterbook  (1868-1871). 
Both  located  in  the  University  of  Colorado  Libraries. 

13.  See,  for  example,  report  of  meeting  of  the  Utah  Silver-Lead  Mining  Company, 
Ltd.,   (Feb.  17,  1874),  Mining  World  (London),  Feb.  21,  1874,  374;  report  of  meeting 
of  the  Mammoth  Copperopolis  of  Utah,  Ltd.,  ibid.,  376 ;  report  of  meeting  of  the  Clifton 
Silver  Mining  Company,  Ltd.   (June  15,  1874),  ibid.,  June  20,  1874,  138-139;  Salt  Lake 
Daily  Herald,  Jan.  15  &  16,  1874. 

14.  Emma  Mine  Investigation,  House  Report  No.   579,  44th  Congress,   1st  Session 
(1875-1876),  875;  Mining  World,  May  17,  1873,  950-951;  Samuel  T.  Paffard,  The  True 
History  of  the  Emma  Mine  (London,  1873),  32,  33. 


126  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

of  £7,582,500  were  formed  and  commenced  operations  in 
those  two  years.  Concentration  was  primarily  in  Colorado, 
with  Nevada,  Idaho,  and  Arizona  trailing.  Utah  by  this  time 
was  no  longer  a  contender. 

Despite  a  near  panic  in  1890  when  the  Barings  crashed, 
the  level  of  investment  remained  high  until  1892 ;  then  a  fall 
in  metal  prices  and  another  international  financial  dislocation 
were  to  cause  the  flow  to  ebb  momentarily.  British  concerns 
throughout  the  West  were  hard  hit  and  often  never  recov- 
ered. A  few  prospered,  most  muddled  along,  many — includ- 
ing the  wicked  Emma — liquidated  their  American  interests 
and  reinvested  in  gold  mines  abroad.15  But  new  capital  was 
attracted  again  after  1894,  although  the  pre-depression  level 
was  never  again  reached.  The  predicted  Cripple  Creek  boom, 
with  a  "Colorado  sideshow"  supplementing  the  "Kaffir  cir- 
cus" did  not  materialize  in  England.16  Perhaps  the  Venezuela 
boundary  scare  was  in  part  to  blame,17  but  more  important 
was  the  increased  competition  of  South  Africa,  the  Yukon, 
and  Australia-New  Zealand  as  rivals  on  the  world  money 
market.  Success  in  these  areas  helped  weaken  the  movement 
of  English  capital  to  the  American  West,  although  British 
investments  did  respond  in  positive  fashion  to  the  Tonopah, 
Goldfield,  and  Rhyolite  rushes  in  Nevada.18  But  the  Panic  of 
1907  brought  a  negative  reaction  and  on  the  eve  of  the  Great 
War  the  period  ended  on  a  note  of  futility,  according  to  the 
London  Economist,  with  "gloom  which  hung  like  a  pall  over 
the  mining  market"  because  capital  was  being  withdrawn 
from  the  mineral  industry  throughout  the  world  in  favor  of 
more  lucrative  if  less  risky  commercial  enterprises.19 

If  profits  are  any  indication,  the  degree  of  success  of  the 
average  Anglo-American  mining  concern  fell  far  short  of  ex- 

15.  Skinner,  Mining  Manual   (1896),   937;  Dickens  Custer  Mines,   Ltd.,  Directors? 
Report,  April  1,   1893,  to  Dec.  31,   1895  ;  Annual  Report,  year  ending  June  30,   1901 ; 
Flagstaff  Company,  Ltd.,  Directors'  Report,  Nov.  13,  1893,  to  June  30,  1895 ;  La  Plata 
Mines,  Ltd.,  Directors'  Report,  Oct.  27.  1892,  to  March  31,  1894 ;  Emma  Company,  Ltd., 
Annual  Report,  year  ending  June  30,  1896.  Unless  otherwise  noted,  all  annual  reports 
and  directors'  reports  are  in  the  London  Stock  Exchange  archives. 

16.  Mining  Journal,  Dec.  21,  1895,  1547. 

17.  Ibid.;  see  also  William  Rogers  to  W.  E.  Tustin  (Wolverhampton,  Jan.  25,  1896), 
copy  in  James  A.  Beaver  MSS,  Pennsylvania  State  University  Libraries. 

18.  British   Nevada   Syndicate,   Ltd.,   Prospectus    (April  26,    1907),   C.R.O.    93138; 
Nevada  Mining  Share  Syndicate,  Ltd.,  Balance  Sheet   (Dec.  31,  1908),  C.R.O.  B85633. 

19.  Economist,  Feb.  7,  1914,  278. 


BRITISH   MINING  127 

pectations.  At  least  fifty-seven  of  the  companies  registered  in 
the  1860-1914  era  paid  dividends  aggregating  about  £11,700,- 
000  prior  to  1915.20  Numerically  this  would  mean  that  one 
company  in  every  ten  ultimately  paid  some  kind  of  dividend. 
But  many  of  these  were  but  token  payments  to  appease  stock- 
holders or  to  sustain  share  prices  artificially.  In  a  few  in- 
stances, officials  even  borrowed  illicitly  to  pay  such  "divi- 
dends."21 Probably  no  more  than  ten  joint-stock  companies, 
only  one  of  which  operated  in  the  Southwest,22  returned  the 
shareholders'  full  investment.  No  wonder  investors  came  to 
believe  that  the  comparative  declension  of  the  word  "mine" 
was  "miner"  and  the  superlative  "minus."23 

If  dividends  were  not  ordinarily  forthcoming  and  if 
mountainous  debts  of  half  a  million  pounds  sometimes  piled 
up,24  wherein  lay  the  blame?  It  was  not  merely  that  "salted" 
properties  were  passed  off  on  the  naive  British  investor,  al- 
though more  than  one  company,  like  the  Jersey  Lily  Gold 
Mines,  Ltd.,  in  Arizona,  paid  dearly  for  mines  in  which  ore 
samples  had  been  "grafted"  where  nature  had  not  intended 
them  to  be.25  The  over-all  story  is  much  more  complex,  with 

20.  Included  were  four  concerns  operating  in   Arizona  or   New  Mexico:   Arizona 
Copper  Company,  Ltd.,  paid  a  total  of  £3,551,835  between  1892  and  1913;  Harquahala 
Gold  Mining   Company,   Ltd.,   also  operating   in   Arizona,   paid    £36,250   in    1893-1894; 
Carlisle  Gold  Mining  Company,  Ltd.    (New  Mexico)    paid    £20,000   in   1888;   and  the 
Lady  Franklin  Mining  Company,  Ltd.    (New  Mexico)    returned  dividends  of   £18,002 
in  1887. 

21.  Thomas   Skinner    (ed.),   The  Stock  Exchange   Year-Book  and  Diary  for  1875 
(London,  n.d.),  162 ;  Paffard,  The  True  History  of  the  Emma  Mine,  33. 

22.  The  only  British  concern  operating  in  the  Southwest  which  returned  at  least 
one  hundred  per  cent  on  the  original  investment  was  the  Arizona  Copper  Company,  Ltd. 

23.  Mining  Journal,  Sept.  9,  1871,  800. 

24.  See  Adelaide  Star  Mines,  Ltd.   [Nevada],  Annual  Report,  year  ending  Oct.  31, 
1912. 

25.  This    company   was    incorporated    in    October,    1895,    to   acquire   mines    in    the 
Hassayampa  district  of  Arizona   from   William   Coles   Bashford   of   Prescott.    Through 
Daniel  Keating   the  concern   acquired   property   for    £100,000   in  shares,   but  soon   ex- 
hausted its  meager  working  capital.  Another  British  firm,  the  Anglo-Continental  Gold 
Syndicate,  Ltd.,  agreed  to  provide  £10,000  for  development  and  for  machinery.  However, 
a  careful  re-sampling  of  Jersey  Lily  ores  by  experts  sent  out  by  the  Anglo-Continental 
Syndicate  led  to  the  conclusion  that  the  original  samples  had  been  "salted"  and  that  the 
property  would  not  pay.  The  Jersey  Lily  company  abandoned  the  mines  and  brought 
suit,  apparently  without  success,  and  the  venture  was  written  off  as  a  total  loss  by  the 
Anglo-Continental   Gold   Syndicate,    Ltd.   Jersey   Lily   Gold   Mines,    Ltd.,    Memorandum 
and  Articles  of  Association,  1-2;  Special  Resolutions  (July  9  &  29,  1897),  C.R.O.  45507; 
Anglo-Continental  Gold   Syndicate,   Ltd.,   Directors'   Report  and  Accounts,    15   months 
ending  March  31,  1899;  London  Times,  April  8,  1899;  The  Statist  (London),  April  29, 
1899.  Charles  Siringo,  well-known  cowboy  and  mining  detective,  gives  a  thinly  disguised 
account  of  the  affair,  calling  it  the  "Kansas  Daisy,"  probably  to  be  sure  his  name  was 


128  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

a  number  of  contributing  factors  combining  to  spell  disillu- 
sionment and  disappointment. 

The  whole  process  of  promoting  mining  enterprises  in 
England  left  the  way  open  for  gross  misrepresentation  and 
the  transfer  of  shoddy  goods  across  the  trans-Atlantic  coun- 
ter. Worthless  claims,  labeled  "prospect  holes"  in  Colorado 
or  Arizona,  became  "permanent  mining  investments"  in  Lon- 
don. Disputed  titles  and  an  occasional  hidden  mortgage 
passed  into  British  hands.26  Prospectuses  spoke  in  glowing 
terms  of  "mountains  of  silver"  in  New  Mexico  and  of  "prob- 
able dividends  of  200  to  300  per  cent"  in  Nevada,27  and  in 
their  optimism  rivaled  accounts  from  Sinbad  the  Sailor,  or 
as  unhappy  investors  more  often  insisted,  from  the  tales  of 
Baron  Munchausen.  Extreme  statements  came  to  be  expected 
as  a  regular  part  of  western  mine  promotion.  "The  stories 
of  all  of  them,"  commented  one  American  engineer  in  Lon- 
don, "are  so  flattering  &  so  highly  coloured  that  it  is  almost 
impossible  to  interest  a  man  in  a  moderate  and  probable  state- 
ment."28 And  to  add  distinction,  each  prospectus  carried  the 
names  of  directors  of  the  new  company-to-be,  the  list  includ- 
ing as  many  eminent  names  as  possible — those  of  nobility, 
military  men,  members  of  parliament,  and  other  public  fig- 
ures whose  presence  might  overawe  the  investing  public.29 
Unfortunately,  too  many  of  the  projects  presented  in  this 

kept  out  of  the  courts.  "A  Mr.  B.  of  that  enterprising  town  [Prescott]  had  put  out  a 
bait  and  caught  some  big  fish  in  England,"  writes  Siringo.  "When  the  aforesaid  big  fish, 
who  were  organized  as  the  Anglo-Continental  Mining  Co.  began  to  smell  a  'mice,'  they 
called  on  the  Dickinson  Agency  to  investigate  and  see  if  their  corn-crib  really  contained 
rats.  Hence,  I  was  sent  to  do  the  cat  act."  Eventually,  according  to  Siringo,  one  of 
those  involved  confessed  privately  that  he  and  "Mr.  B."  had  tampered  with  and  "en- 
riched" the  ore  samples  at  the  time  of  the  property's  sale.  Formal  evidence,  admissible 
in  court,  was  lacking,  however,  and  the  English  were  the  losers.  Charles  A.  Siringo, 
A  Cowboy  Detective  (Chicago,  1912),  268-270.  For  a  more  detailed  case,  in  which  an 
English  concern  successfully  proved  fraud  in  court,  see  the  Mudsill  Mining  Company, 
Ltd.  v.  Watrous,  et  al.,  61  Federal  Reporter  (1894),  164-190. 

26.  In  re  Crooke's  Mining  and  Smelting  Company,  Ltd.,  reported  in  London  Time*, 
Aug.   3,   1885;  W.  J.   Lavington  to  Registrar  of   Companies    (London,   May   2,    1893), 
Ouray  Gold  Mining  Company,  Ltd.,  C.R.O.  24513. 

27.  Pyramid  Range  Silver  Mountain  Company,  Ltd.,  Prospectus  (Jan.  1871)  ;  Lander 
City  Silver  Mining  Company,  Ltd.,  Prospectus  (June,  1865). 

28.  James   Hague  to  John   H.   Bird    (London,   May   10,    1871),   copy,   Hague   MSB, 
Huntington  Library. 

29.  A  typical  example  was  the  United  Arizona  Copper  Company,  Ltd.,  registered 
in   1902.  Included  on  the  concern's  board  were  the  Earl  of   Oxford  and  Admiral  Sir 
William   Cecil   Henry    Domville   of   Ipswich.    United    Arizona    Copper    Company,    Ltd., 
Prospectus  (1902). 


BRITISH    MINING  129 

fashion  could  not  hope  to  live  up  to  promotional  claims  and 
left  the  average  investor  with  a  slim  purse  and  an  attitude 
which,  in  the  words  of  a  contemporary,  "generally  assays 
about  two  tons  of  regret  to  the  square  inch."30 

Many  joint  stock  enterprises  collapsed  from  weaknesses 
in  capital  structure.  While  the  nominal  capital  of  a  concern 
might  vary  between  £100  at  one  extreme  and  £3,000,000  at 
the  other,31  the  more  typical  company  was  capitalized  at  from 
£50,000  to  £500,000.  Likewise,  share  denominations  ranged 
from  one  shilling  to  five  hundred  pounds,  but  the  public 
showed  a  preference  for  those  of  one  pound.32  Regardless  of 
that,  most  Anglo-western  mining  companies  were  overcapi- 
talized, and  despite  numerous  official  and  unofficial  warnings, 
they  invariably  purchased  mines  at  from  three  to  ten  times 
the  price  asked  for  the  same  property  in  America.33  A  Colo- 
radoan  was  frank  in  addressing  a  prospective  English  pro- 
moter in  this  regard  in  1871 : 

When  you  come  here  I  should  advise  you  to  say  nothing  about 
buying  mines  as  these  Yankee  fellows  are  all  anxious  to  sell 
and  the  price  they  ask  is  all  in  proportion  to  the  ability  of  the 
purchaser.  I  could  buy  a  mine  for  5000  dollars  that  they  would 
ask  you  50000  for.34 

As  a  result,  having  plunged  most  of  their  capital  into  the 
purchase  of  property,  most  companies  sorely  lacked  working 
capital.  Next  to  the  cry  of  "fraud"  (usually  unsubstantiated) 
the  most  common  plea  heard  in  company  meetings  in  London 
was  for  additional  operating  funds. 

80.  Harry  J.  Norton,  A  Bird'a-Eye  View  of  the  Black  Hills  Gold  Mining  Region 
(New  York,  1879),  9. 

31.  Turquoise  Syndicate,  Ltd.,  Memorandum  of  Association,  1,  C.R.O.  86874  ;  Harney 
Peak  Consolidated  Tin  Company,  Ltd.,  Notice  of  Increase  of  Capital  (Nov.  12,  1889), 
C.R.O.  B24391. 

32.  Mineral  Assets  Company,  Ltd.,  Statement  of  Nominal  Capital  (Nov.  18,  1898), 
C.R.O.  59582 ;  Clifton  Arizona  Copper  Company,  Ltd.,  Statement  of  Nominal  Capital 
(Dec.  24,  1900),  C.R.O.  B67811. 

33.  Anglo-Colorado  Mining  and  Milling  Guide,  III  (Feb.  24,  1900),  21;  The  Statist, 
Sept.  17,  1887 ;  "Gold  Queen,"  Ltd.,  Memorandum  of  Agreement  between  Thomas  Gilbert 
and  the  "Gold  Queen,"  Ltd.,  C.R.O.  B25811 ;  Ms  Annual  Report  of  Consul  Booker  on 
the  Trade  of  California,  1871    (San  Francisco,  March  8,  1872),  F.O.  115/540;  United 
States  Report  for  the  Year  1899  on  the  Trade  of  the  Consular  District  of  San  Francisco, 
Foreign  Office,  Annual  Series  No.  2506  (1900),  35. 

84.  W.  West  to  George  Heaton  (Black  Hawk,  Colorado,  March  8,  1871).  Teller  Mss. 


130  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Another  factor  contributing  to  a  lack  of  success  was  the 
inability  to  find  satisfactory  solutions  to  problems  of  manage- 
ment across  an  ocean  and  three-quarters  of  a  continent. 
Boards  of  direction  selected  for  their  appeal  to  the  "lord- 
loving  public,"  rather  than  for  administrative  or  mining  ex- 
perience, too  often  proved  inept  or  disinterested.  Most  con- 
cerns refused  to  entrust  their  property  to  unpredictable  Yan- 
kees and  insisted  instead  on  British  engineers  or  mine  cap- 
tains. Probably  the  majority  of  such  men  sent  from  the  home 
islands  were  well-trained  and  competent;  indeed,  many  of 
them  would  have  been  regarded  as  top-flight  mining  experts 
in  any  setting.  Many  of  them  brought  with  them  ideas  and 
processes  stemming  from  years  of  experience  in  mines  and 
smelters  the  world  over  and  were  to  be  of  more  than  passing 
importance  for  their  contributions  to  the  development  of  the 
trans-Mississippi  West. 

But  a  sizable  minority  were  neither  able  nor  qualified  for 
the  positions  of  responsibility  they  were  sent  to  fill.  To  the 
end  of  the  era,  British  companies  never  completely  discarded 
the  idea  "that  a  man  having  been  a  Sunday  school  teacher,  or 
a  most  exemplary  tradesman,  or  a  needy  relative  of  the  presi- 
dent, or  one  of  the  directors  is  sufficient  qualification  to  en- 
able him  to  manage  a  mine  successfully."35  Nepotism  was 
common ;  so  were  misfits.  One  manager  came  to  Colorado  in 
order  to  work  off  a  debt  he  owed  to  the  chairman.36  Another 
in  the  same  region  was  by  profession  a  druggist;37  one  in 
Nevada,  a  dentist.38  James  Thomson,  a  well  known  poet  and 
professional  pessimist,  acted  as  a  company  agent  in  the 
Rockies  for  the  better  part  of  a  year  and  attended  practically 
every  social  function  in  Central  City  during  his  stay,  but 
contributed  nothing  to  the  cause  of  his  firm.39  On  the  other 
hand,  amateurism  need  not  always  be  a  liability.  Edward 
Probert,  ordained  minister  and  formerly  chaplain  to  the 
Duke  of  Northumberland,  served  nearly  a  quarter  of  a  cen- 


35.  William  Weston  to  editor,  Mining  Journal,  May  7,  1881,  561. 

36.  Thomas  A.  Rickard,  Retrospect  (New  York  &  London,  1937),  35. 

37.  Mining  Journal,  July  3,  1874,  732. 

38.  Ibid.,  Feb.  3,  1872,  95. 

39.  Two  of  Thomson's  diaries — one  personal  and  one  dealing  with  business  matters 
of  the  Champion  Gold  and  Silver  Mines  of  Colorado,  Ltd. — are  in  the  Bodleian  Library, 
Oxford  University. 


BRITISH    MINING  131 

tury — and  served  well — as  manager  of  the  successful  Rich- 
mond Consolidated  Mining  Company,  Ltd.,  in  Nevada.40 

Many  English  shareholders  agreed  that  the  honesty  of 
their  managers  varied  inversely  with  the  distance  between 
the  mine  and  the  London  office.  Men  sent  out  from  England 
came  to  feel  "like  the  beggar  sat  on  horseback,"  complained 
one  chairman,  "and  the  consequences  are  most  disastrous."41 
If  the  mines  were  located  in  Britain,  there  would  be  plenty 
of  honest  men  available,  insisted  another,  "but  somehow  or 
other  there  is  something  in  the  atmosphere  of  Utah  so  extraor- 
dinary that  they  no  sooner  get  there  than  they  become  ut- 
terly corrupted."42  Distance  brought  a  certain  independence, 
noted  a  shareholder  of  an  Anglo-Nevada  firm,  that  "comes 
over  a  man  when  he  finds  he  has  neither  a  soul  to  be  saved  nor 
a  stern  to  be  kicked."43 

British  investors  could  point  to  many  examples — often 
taken  out  of  context — of  incompetent  or  unrestrained  mine 
managers.  One  enthusiastically  reported  huge  new  gold  finds 
that  turned  out  to  be  iron  pyrites  ;44  another  purchased  a  fur- 
nace site  five  hundred  miles  from  his  company's  mines,  pay- 
ing $26,000  for  property  which  had  shortly  before  been 
offered  to  an  American  group  for  $11, 000  ;45  a  third  was 
charged  with  completely  bungling  his  work  at  the  mines 
while  expertly  "smelting"  all  the  silver  out  of  shareholders' 
pockets.46  Others  were  accused  of  neglecting  their  jobs  in 
favor  of  the  whiskey  shop  or  the  billiard  saloon  or  to  engage 
in  riding,  hunting,  or  what  has  been  described  as  "the  gallant 
pursuits."47  Many  were  condemned  for  their  failure  to  sub- 
mit regular  accounts  and  for  keeping  the  home  office  unin- 


40.  The  Statist,  Dec.  3,  1887;  Mining  Journal,  Jan.  18,  1873,  60;  Richmond  Con- 
solidated Mining  Company,  Ltd.,  Annual  Report,  year  ending  Feb.  28,  1900. 

41.  Report  of  meeting  of  the  Saturn  Silver  Mining  Company  of  Utah,  Ltd.  (Jan.  12, 
1874),  Mining  World,  Jan.  17,  1874,  139. 

42.  Report  of  meeting  of  the  Flagstaff  Silver  Mining  Company  of  Utah,  Ltd.   (April 
16,  1874),  ibid.,  Apr.  18,  1874,  715. 

43.  Report  of  meeting  of  the  South  Aurora  Silver  Mining  Company,  Ltd.    (Nov.  6, 
1872),  ibid.,  Nov.  9,  1892,  1681. 

44.  Report  of  meeting  of  the  Saturn  Silver  Mining  Company  of  Utah,  Ltd.   (Dec.  9, 
1872),  ibid.,  Dec.  14,  1872,  1928-1929. 

45.  Ibid.,  March  7,  1874,  470. 

46.  "Englishman"  to  editor  (Feb.  17,  1874),  ibid.,  Feb.  21,  1874,  371. 

47.  Ibid.,  Dec.  6,  1873,  1151.  See  also:  Mining  Journal,  Aug.  29,  1874,  931 ;  Colorado 
Miner,  June  25,  1887. 


132  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

formed  for  months  at  a  stretch.  At  the  same  time,  others 
could  be  criticized  for  their  casual  misrepresentation  of  the 
condition  of  the  company  property :  success  was  around  the 
immediate  corner,  they  almost  invariably  predicted.  One 
more  small  capital  outlay  would  assuredly  lead  to  lush 
profits.48 

In  attempts  to  solve  the  problem  of  control  across  dis- 
tance, British  firms  utilized  several  approaches,  but  none 
with  unabridged  success.  They  endeavored  to  hedge  in  their 
managers  with  intricate  but  unenforceable  regulations  de- 
manding strict  and  regular  accounting  of  all  work  done  and 
every  shilling  spent.49  They  tended  to  pay  higher  salaries 
in  the  misplaced  assumption  that  more  pay  meant  superior 
men.  They  sometimes  put  reputable  British  engineering  firms 
in  charge,  but  this  meant  extra  costs.  They  dispatched  roving 
directors  to  keep  an  eye  on  the  mines  from  time  to  time,  but 
the  typical  uninformed  "guinea  pig"  director50  could  easily 
be  misled  by  any  ordinary  manager.  Never,  throughout  the 
period,  did  British  absentee  owners  find  a  satisfactory 
method  of  choosing  and  retaining  competent  supervisory  per- 
sonnel over  whom  real  authority  could  quickly  and  readily  be 
exercised. 

If  by  chance  an  Anglo-American  concern  were  fortunate 
enough  to  have  acquired  paying  property,  had  sufficient  capi- 
tal to  work  it,  and  a  trustworthy  manager  of  ability,  it  might 
well  be  sure  of  being  dragged  through  legal  proceedings  of 
some  sort.  With  the  first  rays  of  prosperity  in  flocked  the 
vultures  of  the  mining  world,  eager  to  pick  clean  its  corporate 
bones.  A  discouraged  British  investor  and  visitor  to  the 
Rockies  commented  in  1879: 

In  the  present  miserable  state  of  the  mining  laws  in  Colorado, 
any  English  capitalist  is  a  downright  fool  to  buy  a  mine  in  this 
district;  for  the  moment  he  proves  it  a  good  one,  all  the 


48.  See :  Tarryall  Creek  Gold  Company,  Ltd.,  Annual  Report,  year  ending  June  30, 
1891;  Poorman  Gold  Mines,  Ltd.,  Circular  to  Shareholders  (June  28,  1901)  ;  Alfred  H. 
Oxenford  to  William  Read  (London,  July  10,  1891),  Read  Mas,  Bancroft  Library. 

49.  See,  for  example,  Eberhardt  and  Aurora  Mining  Company  Ltd.,  "Committee's 
report  on  system  of  returns  on  working  at  mines,"   (n.d. ),  Read  Mas. 

60.  The  term  "guinea  pig"  was  applied  to  men  of  public  stature  who  joined  com- 
pany directorates  for  the  use  of  their  name  and  who  normally  received  the  sum  of  one 
guinea  for  each  directors'  meeting  attended. 


BRITISH    MINING  133 

swindling  sharks  for  fifty  miles  around  appear,  and  combine 
to  oust  him  legally,  or  in  a  few  instances  even  by  force.  .  .  . 
Lawyers  in  high  official  positions  actually  buy  claims  adjacent 
to  English  ones  to  raise  a  disputed  boundary  question.  .  .  .51 

Unfortunately  much  of  the  indictment  was  true.  Again 
and  again,  British  concerns  were  willing  to  apply  the  old 
adage  of  "if  you  can't  lick  'em,  join  'em,"  and  were  inclined 
to  compromise  and  purchase  adjoining  claims  rather  than 
risk  expensive  litigation.52  Those  preferring  to  fight  their 
cases  through  the  courts  found  this  avenue  costly  and  not 
always  certain.  In  the  twenty-seven  months  prior  to  Septem- 
ber 30,  1886,  the  Arizona  Copper  Company,  Ltd.,  recorded 
legal  expenses  of  $23,544.42.53  In  a  quarter  of  a  century  of 
running  litigation  with  an  American  claimant,  the  Montana 
Mining  Company,  Ltd.,  expended  an  estimated  $400,000  in 
defense  of  its  title,  only  to  lose  the  decision  and  its  property 
in  1913.54 

To  be  sure,  litigation  was  the  bane  of  the  mining  world 
and  was  by  no  means  confined  to  British  firms  in  the  West. 
But  English  companies,  because  of  their  general  lack  of  fa- 
miliarity with  the  labyrinths  of  American  mining  law,  were 
particularly  susceptible  to  legal  ensnarlments.  The  adverse 
effects  of  this  were  to  act  as  a  brake  to  discourage  invest- 
ments from  abroad,  as  well  as  literally  to  force  a  number  of 
concerns  from  the  western  field.55 

Probably  federal  restrictions  did  not  deter  investments  or 
bring  corporate  failure  to  any  great  extent,  except  indirectly, 
protests  of  interested  bystanders  to  the  contrary  notwith- 
standing. By  law  no  alien  or  alien  corporation  could  locate 
a  mining  claim  or  obtain  a  patent  directly  from  the  govern- 
ment, although  a  foreign  concern  could  always  acquire  pat- 
si.  Samuel  N.  Townshend,  Colorado:  its  Agriculture,  Stockf ceding,  Scenery,  and 
Shooting  (London,  1879),  63,  64. 

52.  Report  of  meeting  of  the  Richmond  Consolidated  Mining  Company,  Ltd.  (Dec.  8, 
1872),   Mining   World,  Dec.   7,   1872,   1878;  London   Times,  July   20  &   Nov.   12,    1872; 
Statistics  of  Mines  and  Mining  in  the  States  and  Territories  West  of  the  Rocky  Moun- 
tains, House  Executive  Document  No.  159,  44th  Congress,  1st  Session   (1875-1876),  298. 

53.  Arizona  Copper  Company,   Ltd.,   Annual  Report,  year  ending   Sept.   30,   1886. 

54.  Report  of  the  Extraordinary  General  Meeting  at  Merchants'   Hall,  March   18, 
1913,  reprinted  from  the  Mining  World,  March  22,  1913. 

55.  Colorado  Miner,  May  15,   1875 ;  North  American   Exploration   Company,   Ltd., 
Annual  Report,  year  ending  Dec.  31,  1898. 


134  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ented  property  from  an  American  citizen.66  In  actual  practice 
because  decisions  of  the  Land  Office  and  of  federal  courts 
were  not  ordinarily  enforced,57  British  firms  often  left  title 
in  American  hands  while  patents  were  being  obtained.58  But 
rather  than  resort  to  this  subterfuge  and  run  even  the  slight- 
est risk  of  confiscation,  many  English  companies  were  care- 
ful to  purchase  patented  claims  at  the  beginning.  Thus,  since 
patented  property  was  more  expensive  than  unpatented,  fed- 
eral mining  laws  indirectly  contributed  to  boosting  prices 
against  foreign  firms.  Attempts  of  the  Foreign  Office  to  inter- 
cede in  favor  of  modification  that  would  permit  aliens  to 
obtain  patents  directly  met  with  no  success.59 

The  controversial  Alien  Land  Law,  which  in  1887  tech- 
nically barred  any  foreign  citizen  or  corporation  from  acquir- 
ing or  holding  real  estate  in  the  territories,60  presented  no 
real  threat  to  British  mining  interests.  It  was  not  retroactive 
and  might  easily  be  evaded  by  leasing  rather  than  buying 
property  or  by  the  established  device  of  leaving  title  in  the 
name  of  subsidiary  concerns  or  American  managers.  Thus, 
when  the  Buster  Mines  Syndicate,  Ltd.,  was  formed  in  1892 
to  acquire  copper  interests  in  Arizona,  the  promoter  agreed 
to  give  the  company  a  ninety-nine  year  lease  immediately 
and  full  title  "as  soon  as  Arizona  is  admitted  as  a  State" — 
all  for  the  bargain  price  of  $32,000.61  Another  Anglo-South- 
western concern,  the  Harquahala  Gold  Mining  Company, 
Ltd.,  a  year  later  signed  a  working  agreement  with  an  Amer- 
ican firm,  paying  £270,000  in  exchange  for  97^  per  cent  of 
the  firm's  profits  for  a  period  of  forty-two  years.62  Although 

56.  Act  of  May  10,  1872,  17  U.S.  Statutes,  91,  94. 

67.  Lee  v.  Justice  Mining  Company,  29  Pacific  Reporter  (1892),  1020-1021 ;  10  Gen- 
eral Land  Office  Decisions  (1890),  641-642. 

58.  Mining   World,  Nov.  22,   1873,  1044;  Mining  Journal,  Aug.   15,  1874,   889;  De 
Lamar  Mining  Company,  Ltd.,  Memorandum  of  Agreement   (March  2,  1891)   between 
the  Mining  and  Financial  Trust  Syndicate,  Ltd.,  and  Thomas  Major,  C.R.O.  33492. 

59.  See:  Congressional  Record,  Jan.  11,  1875,  361;  Sir  Edward  Thornton  to  Lewis 
Chalmers   (Washington,  Jan.  81,  1875),  draft,  F.O.  115/596;  Lord  Derby  to  Thornton 
(London,  March  11,  1876)  ;  Thornton  to  Derby   (Washington,  March  27,   1876),  F.O. 
5/1543. 

60.  Act  of  March  3,  1887,  24  U.S.  Statutes,  476-477. 

61.  Buster  Mines  Syndicate,  Ltd.,  Prospectus  (1892).  On  the  back  of  this  prospectus 
is  written  in  ink  the  Memorandum  of  Agreement  (April  8,  1892)  between  Frederick  C. 
Beckwith,  the  vendor,  and  James  Shearer,  representing  the  company. 

62.  Skinner,  Mining  Manual  (1894),  159;  Harquahala  Gold  Mining  Company,  Ltd., 
Memorandum  and  Articles  of  Association,  1,  C.R.O.  39025. 


BRITISH    MINING  135 

territorial  legislatures  complained  bitterly  that  the  act  was 
blocking  much  British  investment,63  over  twice  as  much  Brit- 
ish mining  capital  came  into  the  territories  in  the  three  and 
a  quarter  years  immediately  following  the  law's  enactment 
as  came  in  the  corresponding  period  just  before.64 

Failure,  then,  might  be  attributed  to  any  one  or  a  com- 
bination of  several  causes,  of  which  federal  policy  was  unim- 
portant: a  certain  amount  of  chicanery — or  at  least 
misrepresentation ;  overcapitalization,  yet  a  lack  of  working 
capital;  exorbitant  prices  paid  for  property;  the  perils  of 
management  across  vast  distances;  and  the  perplexities  of 
American  mining  law.  More  basic  was  the  fact  that  mining 
in  general  is  fundamentally  the  story  of  risk.  There  was  much 
truth  in  the  old  miners'  proverb  that  only  a  fool  predicted 
beyond  the  end  of  his  pick.  An  innate  gambling  spirit  and 
the  hope  of  striking  the  mineralogical  jackpot  prompted 
many  an  investor  to  plunge  on  the  market,  often  with  little 
distinction  between  undeveloped  mines  and  those  actually 
producing.  British  investment  was  but  part  of  the  larger 
whole ;  part  of  the  unchecked  plundering  of  America's  natu- 
ral resources  at  an  unprecedented  rate;  part  of  what  Ver- 
non  L.  Parrington  calls  the  "Great  Barbecue."  Human  nature 
being  what  it  is,  if  investors — British  or  otherwise — stood 
too  close  to  the  pit  and  were  singed,  that  was  not  unexpected. 

BRITISH  JOINT-STOCK  COMPANIES  REGISTERED  TO 
OPERATE  MINES  OR  MILLS  IN  ARIZONA  AND  NEW 

MEXICO,  1860-191465 

Companies  formed  to  operate  in  Arizona  Nominal 

Name  of  Company  Year   Active?       Capital 

Anglo-American  Copper  Company  1905       Yes         £     2,100 

Argyle  Mining  Company*  1900       No  100,000 


63.  See  Memorials  to  Congress  in  Laws  of  Montana  Territory,  15th  Extraordinary 
Session   (1887),  111-112;  General  Laws  of  the  Territory  of  Idaho,  15th  Session    (1888- 
1889),  70-71;  Laws  of  the  Territory  of  Utah,  28th  Session    (1888),  220-221;  Laws  of 
New  Mexico,  28th  Session   (1889),  364. 

64.  Six  companies,  capitalized  at  £1,150,000,  were  formed  in  the  period  just  prior 
to  the  enactment  of  the  law;  sixteen,  with  a  capital  of  £2,934,000,  in  the  comparable 
three  and  a  quarter  years  following.  Dakota  and  Montana  have  been  excluded  because 
of  their  statehood  beginning  in  1889. 

65.  Companies  whose  names  are  followed  by  an  asterisk  were  registered  in  Edin- 
burgh ;  the  remainder  were  registered  in  London,  except  for  Omnium  Francais  Minier, 
Ltd.,  which  was  incorporated  in  the  Isle  of  Guernsey.   Indentations   represent  recon- 
structions of  earlier  companies. 


136 


NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 


Name  of  Company 
Arivica  Mining  Company 
Arizona  Consolidated  Copper  Mines 
Arizona  Copper  Company* 

Arizona  Copper  Company* 
Arizona  Mortgage  Corporation 
Arizona  Trust  and  Mortgage  Company 
British  Arizona  Company* 
Buster  Mines  Syndicate 
Canada  Del  Oro  Mines 

Tucson  Mining  and  Smelting  Company 
Catalina  Gold  Mines 
Catoctin  Silver  Mining  Company 
Clifton  Arizona  Copper  Company 
Clifton  Consolidated  Copper  Mines 

of  Arizona 

Clifton  Gold  Mining  Company 
Clifton-Morenci  Syndicate 
Cochise  Mill  and  Mining  Company 
Colorado  Copper  Company 
Continental  Finance  Syndicate 
Copper  Queen 
Copper  Queen  United 
Elkhart  Mining  Corporation 
Globe  Mineral  Exploration  Company 
Gold-Basin  Mining  Company* 
Golden  Reefs 
Golden  State  Mines 

Grand  Canyon  Mining  Company  of  Arizona 
Harquahala  Gold  Mining  Company 

King  of  the  Hills  Gold  Mining  Company 
Jersey  Lily  Gold  Mines 
Kaiser  Gold  Mines 
Keating  Copper  Syndicate 
Leland  Stanford  Gold  Mining  Company 
Lynx  Creek  Gold  and  Land  Company 
Lynx  Creek  Gold  Mining  Company 
Mammoth- Collins  Gold  Mines 
Mammoth  Gold  Mines 
Mineral  Hills  Copper  Syndicate* 
Monte  Cristo  Mining  Company 
Morenci  and  General  Trust 
Morenci  Copper  Mines 
New  Arizona  Syndicate 


Nominal 

Year 

Active? 

Capital 

1869 

No 

200,000 

1899 

Yes 

150,000 

1882 

Yes 

875,000 

1884 

Yes 

715,000 

1899 

No 

10,000 

1883 

Yes 

360,000 

1913 

Yes 

25,000 

1892 

Yes 

15,000 

1891 

Yes 

30,000 

1894 

Yes 

20,000 

1893 

Yes 

25,000 

1891 

No 

25,000 

1900 

Yes 

10,000 

1901 

Yes 

500,000 

1894 

No 

2,000 

1910 

No 

20,000 

1892 

No 

30,000 

1867 

No 

150,000 

1902 

Yes 

12,000 

1884 

No 

500,000 

1885 

No 

350,000 

1900 

Yes 

300,000 

1898 

Yes 

50,000 

1896 

No 

150,000 

1895 

No 

50,000 

1897 

Yes 

100,000 

1890 

Yes 

75,000 

1893 

Yes 

300,000 

1899 

Yes 

80,000 

1895 

Yes 

150,000 

1888 

No 

200,000 

1913 

Yes 

11,000 

1895 

Yes 

60,000 

1890 

Yes 

80,000 

1896 

Yes 

50,000 

1895 

Yes 

100,000 

1889 

Yes 

500,000 

1900 

Yes 

5,000 

1900 

Yes 

100,000 

1900 

Yes 

50,000 

1899 

Yes 

100,000 

1912 

No 

2,000 

BRITISH    MINING 


137 


Name  of  Company 

New  London  Mining  Company 

Northern  Syndicate 

Old  Guard  Mining  Company 

Occident  Gold  Mining  Company 

Omnium  Francais  Minier 

Prescott  Development  Company* 

Ray  Copper  Mines 

Rich  Hill  Gold  Mines 

Santa  Catalina  Gold  and  Silver  Mining  Co. 

Silver  Bell  Mining  and  Smelting  Company 

Spanish  King  Mining  Company 

Star  Syndicate 

Storm  Cloud  Gold  Mines 

Storm  Cloude  Syndicate 

Syndicate  No.  1 

Tinto  Copper  Mines 

Tubac  Mining  and  Milling  Company 

Tumacacori  Mining  and  Land  Company 

Sonora  Company 
Turquoise  Syndicate 
United  Arizona  Copper  Company 
Victorian  Mine  Syndicate 
Western  Syndicate 

Total  for  Arizona 

Companies  formed  to  operate  in  New  Mexico 

Aztec  Gold  Mines 

Carlisle  Gold  Mining  Company 

Cerrillos  Mining  Company 

Geronimo  Gold  and  Silver  Mining 

Syndicate  of  New  Mexico 
Golden  Leaf 

Grand  Central  Silver  Mines 
Lady  Franklin  Mining  Company 
Little  Wonder  Gold  Mines 
London  and  New  Mexico  Company 
New  Mexican  Copper  Company 
Turquoise  Mines  (Calaite) 
Turquoise  Syndicate 

Total  for  New  Mexico 

Total  for  New  Mexico  and  Arizona  (79) 


Nominal 

Year 

Active  ?      Capital 

1907 

Yes            20,000 

1887 

Yes             25,000 

1887 

Yes           200,000 

1912 

Yes            20,000 

1903 

Yes          320,000 

1895 

Yes          100,000 

1899 

Yes           360,000 

1892 

No              80,000 

1888 

No            225,000 

1890 

Yes           170,000 

1912 

No                1,000 

1889 

Yes            not  set 

1888 

No           100,000 

1893 

No             50,000 

1899 

Yes              1,000 

1895 

Yes          100,000 

1870 

No              50,000 

1879 

Yes  no  informa- 

tion 

1874 

No         1,000,000 

1905 

No                  100 

1902 

Yes           200,000 

1890 

No             not  set 

1887 

No              25,000 

£9,686,200 

1893 

Yes          100,000 

1886 

Yes           200,000 

1889 

Yes            40,000 

1899 

Yes            20,000 

1889 

Yes          350,000 

1891 

Yes          200,000 

1886 

Yes           200,000 

1900 

No              30,000 

1883 

No                1,000 

1898 

No            100,000 

1900 

No              60,000 

1897 

Yes            10,000 

£1,311,000 

[79) 

£10,997,200 

[NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW,  Vol.  36,  No.  2.  April,  1961] 


FRANK  BOND:  GENTLEMAN  SHEEPHERDER 
OF  NORTHERN  NEW  MEXICO,  1883-1915 

By  FRANK  H.  GRUBBS 

4.  A.  MacArthur  Company 

FRANK  Bond  had  arrived  in  the  Territory  of  New  Mexico 
as  an  alien,  holding  Canadian  citizenship.  Grateful  to  the 
country  that  had  rewarded  his  diligence  with  generous  suc- 
cess, he  promptly  applied  for  United  States  citizenship.  In 
the  due  course  of  time  his  final  admission  papers  were  is- 
sued, and  he  became  a  full  citizen,  appropriately  enough,  in 
August,  1890,1  just  about  the  time  that  he  and  George  Bond 
were  beginning  to  explore  the  possibility  of  establishing  the 
first  branch  of  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro. 

At  this  time,  John  Justus  Schmidt  was  operating  a  gen- 
eral store  in  Wagon  Mound,  New  Mexico.  A  German  immi- 
grant who  had  arrived  in  the  Territory  in  1870,  Schmidt  had 
also  operated  a  store  in  Watrous,  New  Mexico.  He  had  de- 
veloped a  highly  successful  merchandise  business  in  Wagon 
Mound,  built  a  large  store  building  and  warehouse,  and  was 
considered  one  of  the  foremost  merchants  in  that  area.  In 
addition  to  the  merchandise  business,  Schmidt  traded  in 
sheep  and  wool  and  kept  some  sheep  on  rent.  Among  his 
renters  was  a  partidario  named  J.  D.  Gallegos  who  thought 
he  might  better  his  position  by  very  quietly  moving  to  Raton 
and  taking  the  Schmidt  sheep  along  with  him.  In  order  to 
prevent  the  loss  of  his  sheep,  Schmidt  obtained  a  restraining 
order  from  the  court  in  Las  Vegas,  much  to  the  chagrin  of 
Gallegos  who  followed  the  Schmidt  family  on  July  1,  1892, 
as  they  drove  out  to  inspect  some  wells  in  which  they  had  an 
interest.  Threatened  with  a  rifle,  Schmidt  jumped  from  the 
buggy  and  Gallegos  shot  him.  The  buggy  team  ran  away  with 
Mrs.  Schmidt  who  in  her  panic  threw  the  baby  out.  Before 
expiring,  Schmidt  shot  the  unruly  sheep  renter  with  a 
derringer.2 

1.  Certificate  of  Admission  to  Citizenship,  Terr,  of  N.  Mex.,  First  Judicial  District, 
County  of  Santa  Fe,  August  14,  1890,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit.  Bond's  residence  and  moral 
character  witnesses  were  E.  N.  Reaser  and  Pedro  Y.  Jaramillo. 

2.  Interview  with  E.  W.  Howe,  Wagon  Mound,  New  Mexico,  April  27,  1957 ;  Helen 

138 


FRANK  BOND  139 

Thus  the  first  branch  of  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  began  in  truly 
western  fashion,  for  the  widowed  Mrs.  Schmidt  sold  the 
entire  business  to  the  Bonds  later  that  same  year.3 

The  new  Wagon  Mound  business  was  also  called  G.  W. 
Bond  &  Bro.  and  was  located  in  the  store  building  at  the 
corner  of  Catron  Avenue  and  Railroad  in  Wagon  Mound, 
New  Mexico,  the  property  being  purchased  in  the  names  of 
G.  W.  Bond  and  Frank  Bond  and  their  wives,  Agnes  D.  Bond 
and  May  Anna  Bond.4 

No  record  now  exists  of  the  exact  price  paid  for  the 
Schmidt  business,  but  the  original  price  paid  for  the  prop- 
erty appears  to  have  been  $3,000  or  $3,500.  The  total  initial 
investment  in  the  venture  was  about  $40,000,  the  major  por- 
tion of  the  capital  being  supplied  by  the  Espanola  firm,  lesser 
sums  being  invested  personally  by  the  brothers  as  equal 
partners.  In  addition  to  the  direct  loan  from  Espanola,  the 
elder  Mr.  Bond  in  Canada  invested  $8,000  in  the  business, 
receiving  a  note  from  his  sons.5  At  the  end  of  1893,  the  first 
year  of  business,  the  Bond  investments  before  distribution 
of  profits  appeared  as  shown  in  Table  17. 

TABLE  17 
BOND  INVESTMENTS  IN  WAGON  MOUND 

Amount 

G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.,  Espanola $26,919.29 

G.  W.  Bond 1,676.12 

Frank  Bond  2,556.77 

G.  W.  Bond,  Canada 8,000.00 

Total  $39,152.18 

The  history  of  the  Wagon  Mound  store  is  interwoven 
with  two  men  of  considerable  executive  ability  who  exerted 
important  influences  on  the  company  through  the  years. 

Haines,  History  of  New  Mexico  (New  York:  New  Mexico  Historical  Publishing  Co., 
1891),  p.  455;  An  Illustrated  History  of  New  Mexico  (Chicago:  The  Lewis  Publishing 
Co.,  1895),  pp.  373-374.  Versions  of  this  story  vary  slightly  in  details,  and  since  Howe's 
recollection  of  the  event  is  recorded  nowhere  else  in  the  literature  of  New  Mexico  history, 
that  is  the  one  recited  here. 

3.  E.  W.  Howe,  personal  letter,  May  8,  1957. 

4.  Warranty  Deed,  August  13,   1903    (in  files  of  Vorenberg  Bros.,  Wagon  Mound, 
New  Mexico ) . 

5.  Records,  loc.  cit. 


140  NEW   MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

These  were  Archibald  (Archie)  Mac  Arthur  and  Manuel  Pal- 
tenghe.6  MacArthur  was  an  old  friend  of  the  Bond  family 
and  came  down  from  Quebec  during  the  second  year  of 
operation,  in  1894,  to  work  in  the  Wagon  Mound  store.7  He 
later  became  a  principal  stockholder,  and  the  business,  still 
bearing  his  name,  is  presently  operated  by  his  son,  Archibald 
Stuart. 

Manuel  Paltenghe  was  a  native  of  Wagon  Mound  and  the 
son  of  a  local  butcher,  Alex  Paltenghe.  Born  in  1873,  he 
worked  for  J.  J.  Schmidt  beginning  in  about  1888,  carried 
over  to  work  for  the  new  owners,  and  later  rose  to  become  an 
active  partner  in  the  business.8 

Management  of  the  new  Wagon  Mound  store  was  taken 
over  by  G.  W.  Bond  who  moved  to  Wagon  Mound  from 
Espanola,  leaving  Frank  to  manage  the  firm  there.  A  part- 
nership organization  until  it  was  incorporated  in  1904,  no 
trace  of  a  written  partnership  agreement  has  been  found,  and 
it  is  highly  unlikely  that  one  did  in  fact  exist.  The  individual 
investment  accounts  varied  widely  during  the  eleven  years  of 
partnership  existence,  but  profits  were  always  divided  evenly 
between  the  partners  at  the  end  of  each  year.  As  a  general 
rule,  however,  Frank  Bond  left  his  profits  in  the  business 
and  let  them  accumulate;  George,  on  the  other  hand,  had 
occasion  from  time  to  time  to  withdraw  large  sums  from  his 
account,  replacing  them  in  whole  or  in  part  as  the  needs  of 
the  business  demanded.  Table  18  reflects  the  partnership  in- 
vestment before  distribution  of  profits  at  the  end  of  the  years 
indicated. 

TABLE  18 

WAGON  MOUND  INVESTMENT  ACCOUNTS 
(dollars  in  thousands) 


End  of  Year 

G.  W.  Bond 

F.  Bond 

1893 

$    1.7 

$    2.6 

1894 

4.5 

5.6 

1895 

12.6 

14.0 

6.  Pronounced  "pat-ten-gay." 

7.  Interview  with   Stuart  MacArthur.  But  cf.,   Davis,   op.   eit.,  p.    1870,   recording 
MacArthur' s  arrival  in  Wagon  Mound  in  1890.  Since  the  store  was  not  operated  by  the 
Bonds  until  189S,  serious  doubt  is  cast  upon  the  1890  date. 

8.  Interview  with  E.  W.  Howe. 


FRANK  BOND                                            141 

End  of  Year 

G.  W.  Bond 

F.  Bond 

1896 

12.1 

20.1 

1897 

5.2 

23.6 

1898 

23.6 

38.9 

1899 

19.2 

42.6 

1900 

28.0 

52.1 

1901 

...... 

1902 

...... 

1903 

20.4 

53.5 

During  this  period  a  continuing  necessity  existed  for  capi- 
tal support  of  the  Wagon  Mound  store  by  the  Espanola  busi- 
ness as  well  as  through  short  term  cash  borrowings  from  the 
bank  and  also  from  George  William  Bond  in  Canada,  as 
shown  in  Table  19.  The  note  in  favor  of  G.  W.  Bond  in 
Canada  was  carried  through  the  years  as  an  investment  by 
the  elder  Mr.  Bond  rather  than  through  any  real  requirement 
of  the  business.  The  note  carried  interest  at  4  per  cent  and 
seems  to  have  been  finally  paid  in  1914,  although  the  records 
are  not  perfectly  clear  on  this  point. 

The  principal  activity  at  Wagon  Mound  was  the  sale  of 
general  merchandise,  but  sheep  were  traded  by  the  Bonds  at 
least  as  early  as  1894,  there  being  $3,300  worth  of  sheep  in 
feed  lots  in  Fort  Collins,  Colorado,  during  the  winter  of  1894- 
1895.  A  significant  investment  in  sheep  continued  throughout 

TABLE  19 

MAJOR  LIABILITIES  AT  WAGON  MOUND 
(dollars  in  thousands) 


End  of  Year 

G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro. 

Espanola 

G.  Wm.  Bond 
Canada 

Other 
Bills 

1893 

1894 

$26.2 
32.8 

$8.0 
5.0 

$   0.0 
3.0 

1895 

40.4 

5.8 

5.0 

1896 

47.0 

5.0 

.0 

1897 

47.0 

5.5 

.0 

1898 

48.4 

5.0 

10.0 

1899 

48.3 

5.0 

14.5 

1900 

47.2 

5.0 

30.0 

1901 

47.4 

...... 

...... 

1902 

50.0 





1903 

53.2 

5.0 

.0 

142  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

the  period  under  study,  ranging  from  a  low  of  $20  at  the  end 
of  1893  to  a  high  of  more  than  $46,000  at  the  end  of  1898. 
The  year-end  investment  in  sheep  fluctuated  due  to  variations 
in  the  flocks  and  the  delivery  schedule  of  sheep  sold,  but  the 
year-end  balances  largely  reflect  the  extent  of  feeding  opera- 
tions undertaken  in  the  winter.  The  sheep  investment  during 
the  eleven  years  of  the  partnership  reflected  a  steady  growth 
throughout  the  period,  but  when  the  business  was  incorpo- 
rated in  1904,  the  sheep  account  was  transferred  completely 
out,  possibly  to  Roy,  New  Mexico.  However,  after  that  time, 
the  Wagon  Mound  sheep  investment  account  began  to  grow 
steadily  again,  and  by  1914  it  was  more  than  it  had  been  at 
the  end  of  the  partnership  in  1904.9 

Detailed  profit  data  for  the  years  prior  to  1912  are  not 
available,  but  a  comparison  of  profits  on  merchandise,  sheep, 
and  wool  for  the  years  as  indicated  in  Table  20  reveals  that 
profits  from  sheep  did  not  exceed  the  profits  from  the  mer- 
cantile business  until  1914,  and  it  is  highly  probable  that  the 
earlier  years  reflected  the  same  condition. 

TABLE  20 
WAGON  MOUND  NET  PROFIT  FOR  SELECTED  YEARS 

Year  On  Merchandise  On  Sheep 

1912  $18,104.61  $  4,098.83 

1913  26,925.83  4,269.40 

1914  5,624.06  13,028.55 

1915  11,152.56  15,604.66 

The  precise  way  in  which  the  Wagon  Mound  sheep  busi- 
ness was  carried  on  is  not  known  since  the  sheep  on  hand  and 
those  rented  out  were  generally  combined,  and  due  to  early 
profit  data  being  unavailable  the  exact  extent  of  trading  is 
unknown.  However,  it  is  fairly  clear  that  flocks  were  not 
rented  out  to  partidarios  to  any  significant  extent  until  about 
1895.  Some  notion  as  to  the  size  of  the  rented  flocks  can  be 
gained  from  Table  21.  Data  for  other  years  are  unavailable. 

9.  Records,  loc.  cit. 


FRANK   BOND  143 

TABLE  21 
WAGON  MOUND  PARTIDA  FOR  SELECTED  YEARS 

Year  Sheep 

1900  30,000 

1903 20,000 

1913  12,000a 

1915 10,654 

a.  Rented  at  20  lambs  per  100  ewes.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  January  10,  1914. 

Trading-  in  wool  by  the  Wagon  Mound  store  continued  to 
be  of  a  relatively  minor  nature.  George  got  off  to  an  inaus- 
picious start  in  1895  when  he  wrote  off  to  profit  and  loss  "over 
$2,000.00  for  wool  as  we  are  doubtful  of  getting  anything 
further  out  of  consignment  of  last  August.  We  are  sure  not 
to  unless  the  tariff  bill  passes."10  Profits  on  the  sale  of  wool 
during  the  years  from  1912  to  1915  averaged  about  $3,500  a 
year.  Wagon  Mound  wool  was  generally  marketed  in  Boston, 
but  some  was  also  shipped  to  the  scouring  mill  in  Trinidad, 
Colorado.11 

The  mercantile  business  flourished,  however,  and  it  ac- 
counted for  the  major  portion  of  the  profits,  exhibiting  a 
steady  and  healthy  growth.  The  only  available  profit  data  on 
this  activity  are  presented  in  Table  20,  supra,  but  the  year- 
end  investment  in  merchandise  inventory  is  noteworthy  and 
is  presented  in  Table  22. 

No  absolute  reason  can  be  advanced  as  to  why  the  mer- 
chandise inventory  was  valued  at  zero  at  the  end  of  1903,  but 
it  may  have  been  due  to  a  fire  loss  suffered  in  that  year.  It  is 
interesting  to  note  that  the  merchandise  inventories  were 
valued  at  ninety  cents  on  the  dollar  in  1897,  seventy-five  cents 
in  1898,  and  ninety  cents  in  1899.  That  portion  of  the  mer- 
chandise inventory  that  may  have  been  on  consignment  was 
usually  reflected  as  a  liability. 

Conservatism  in  asset  valuation  is  further  indicated  by 
the  fact  that  open  accounts  receivable  were  usually  valued  at 
seventy-five  cents  as  were  bills  receivable,  except  that  prior 
to  1900  bills  were  examined  individually  and  only  those  con- 
sidered to  be  actually  collectible  were  reported  as  a  receivable. 

10.  Ibid. 

11.  Ibid. ;  Infra,  chap.  viii. 


144  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

In  later  years,  beginning  about  1912,  the  value  placed  on  bills 
and  accounts  was  increased  to  ninety  cents  on  the  dollar. 
After  1912,  real  estate  and  merchandise  inventories  were 
valued  at  seventy-five  per  cent  of  book  cost. 

TABLE  22 

INVESTMENT  IN  MERCHANDISE  INVENTORY, 
WAGON  MOUND 

(dollars  in  thousands) 

End  of  Year  Amount 

1893  $17.9 

1894  19.5 

1895  21.6 

1896  16.8 

1897  27.4 

1898  28.9 

1899  33.8 

1900  28.9 

1901  

1902  

1903  „ 0 

1904  17.1 

1905  22.3 

1906  28.6 

1907  33.4 

1908  _ 35.7 

1909  34.3 

1910  31.4 

1911  30.5 

1912  32.9 

1913  40.6 

1914  43.7 

1915  46.0 

Activity  at  Wagon  Mound  was  by  no  means  limited  to 
merchandise,  sheep,  and  wool.  No  respectable  opportunity 
that  promised  a  return  of  profit  was  denied  so  long  as  the 
risk  was  reasonable  and  the  expected  return  was  commen- 
surate with  the  risk.  The  regular  mercantile  lines  were  sup- 
plemented with  lumber,  hay,  wagons,  and  beans,  there  being 
almost  $3,000  in  beans  on  hand  at  the  end  of  1911.  Invest- 
ments were  made  intermittently,  but  frequently,  in  horses, 
mules,  and  cattle  as  well  as  hides  and  pelts  beginning  in  1914. 
These  inventory  figures  are  typical  and  are  quoted  in  Table 


FRANK  BOND  145 

23  for  comparison  with  those  of  the  regular  mercantile  line. 
In  1914  a  profit  of  $69.50  was  realized  from  the  sale  of  cream 
and  $253.00  from  the  sale  of  bones ;  the  previous  year  saw 
$890.00  made  on  the  sale  of  rams.12 

TABLE  23 
COMMODITY  INVESTMENT,  WAGON  MOUND' 

Item  Amount 

Lumber  $1,500 

Hay 2,500 

Beans    3,000 

Hides 150 

a.  No  specific  years  are  represented.  These  are  typical  amounts. 

In  accordance  with  Bond's  general  policy,  cash  balances 
on  hand  were  maintained  at  a  low  level,  year-end  balances 
rarely  exceeding  $1,200  and  more  frequently  being  in  the 
$500-$750  range.  Cash  deposits  were  initially  maintained  in 
the  San  Miguel  National  Bank,  but  this  account  was  closed  in 
1894.  Thereafter,  the  depository  bank  was  the  First  National 
Bank  in  Las  Vegas,  New  Mexico.  Overdrafts  in  the  bank 
account  were  not  uncommon,  ranging  as  high  as  $4,000  in 
early  1900.13 

The  real  estate  account  included  the  store  buildings  and 
was  not  depreciated  during  the  twenty-three  years  under 
study  except  that  in  1912, 1913,  and  1914,  the  investment  was 
valued  at  75  per  cent  of  cost.  The  same  is  true  of  the  store 
and  warehouse  furniture  account.  Initial  investment  in  store 
property  was  $3,976,  and  additional  costs  of  about  $1,600 
were  capitalized  the  following  year,  1894.  By  1898  the  ac- 
count had  increased  to  nearly  $8,000  and  $3,000  more  was 
added  in  1899.  Just  what  this  additional  investment  rep- 
resented is  unknown.  However,  the  investment  in  store 
buildings  and  furniture  was  completely  written  off  in  1903, 
presumably  due  to  the  fire.  After  the  business  was  incor- 
porated, the  new  investment  was  $4,721  in  real  estate  and 
$1,357  in  furniture,  increasing  gradually  through  the  follow- 
ing years  but  never  exceeding  about  $11,000  for  both  ac- 
counts.14 In  1913,  the  directors  authorized  Andy  Wiest  to 

12.  Ibid. 
18.  Ibid. 
14.  Ibid. 


146  NEW    MEXICO   HISTORICAL   REVIEW 

proceed  with  the  erection  of  an  addition  to  the  main  store 
building,  and  this  accounted  for  an  increase  of  about  $2,500 
in  that  year.15 

Investments  in  outside  real  estate  were  not  to  be  ignored. 
Some  real  estate  possibly  was  acquired  in  connection  with  the 
settlement  of  accounts  in  the  store  since  by  far  the  largest 
part  of  sales  were  on  credit,  and  the  collection  of  some  ac- 
counts occasionally  forced  the  owners  to  take  over  ranch 
property  although  it  was  usually  done  unwillingly  due  not 
only  to  the  risk  involved  and  the  time  and  effort  necessary  to 
sell  it,  but  also  to  the  Bonds'  reluctance  to  take  such  drastic 
steps  against  their  customers  and  friends.  Instances  are  cited 
elsewhere  to  illustrate  the  endless  patience  yet  dogged  per- 
sistence exercised  in  connection  with  credit  problems. 

Investment  in  property  by  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.,  Wagon 
Mound,  included  about  $300  in  the  Trujillo  Ranch  from  1896 
to  1899  and  the  Mogote  and  Vermejo  Ranches  during  the 
same  period  for  approximately  $1,000  each. 

A  larger  investment  was  made  about  the  turn  of  the  cen- 
tury in  the  eastern  plains  region  when  the  Esteros  Ranch  was 
purchased  for  $6,800.  This  ranch,  lying  near  Esteros  Lake, 
was  about  fifteen  miles  northwest  of  Santa  Rosa,  in  Leonard 
Wood  County.16  Whether  the  Esteros  Ranch  was  situated 
wholly  within  the  Anton  Chico  Grant  or  the  Preston  Beck 
Grant  is  not  clear,  but  the  entire  area  was  of  growing  interest 
to  George  and  Frank  Bond  for  in  1900  they  made  an  impor- 
tant addition  to  their  holdings  by  purchasing  the  Preston 
Beck  Grant. 

The  grant  had  been  officially  designated  as  the  Hacienda 
of  San  Juan  Bautista  del  Ojito  del  Rio  de  las  Gallines  when  it 
was  made  to  Juan  Estevan  Pino  in  1823.  His  heirs  sold  the 
grant  to  Preston  Beck,  and  it  was  confirmed  to  Preston  Beck, 
Jr.,  in  I860.17  The  Bonds  bought  the  grant,  however,  from 
some  unidentified  parties  in  California,  working  through 
Hugh  Loudon  who  was  at  the  time  manager  of  the  Scottish 


15.  Minutes  of  Regular  Annual  Meeting,   March   1,   1913    (in   the  files  of  the  A. 
Mac  Arthur  Company,  Wagon  Mound,  New  Mexico). 

16.  The  present  Guadalupe  County  was  formerly  known  as  Leonard  Wood  County. 

17.  History  of  New  Mexico,  Its  Resources  and  People   (Los  Angeles:  Pacific  States 
Publishing  Company,  1907),  II,  176. 


FRANK  BOND  147 

Mortgage  and  Land  Investment  Company  of  New  Mexico,  in 
Las  Vegas.18  The  property  purchased  consisted  of  62,901 
acres  of  land  lying  partly  in  Leonard  Wood  County  and  partly 
in  San  Miguel  County,  directly  north  of  Santa  Rosa. 

The  Bonds  paid  $43,000  for  the  grant  property  and  ex- 
pected that  the  proceeds  from  its  resale  would  more  than 
cover  their  anticipated  losses  on  the  Esteros  Ranch  which 
they  did  not  consider  to  be  worth  its  cost.19  The  Esteros 
Ranch  and  the  Beck  Grant  investments  were  therefore  com- 
bined,20 representing  a  total  investment  of  $49,933.38,  and 
when  the  Wagon  Mound  store  was  reorganized  in  1904  and 
G.  W.  Bond  moved  to  Trinidad,  this  investment  was  trans- 
ferred from  the  Wagon  Mound  investment  to  the  Trinidad 
books  of  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  The  grant  was  rented  to  J.  D. 
Hand  who  was  given  an  option  to  buy  the  grant  at  $1.60  per 
acre,  to  be  paid  $10,000  down,  $15,000  on  delivery,  and  the 
balance  at  6  per  cent  interest.21  The  Bonds  wanted  to  net 
$1.50  per  acre  on  the  grant,  but  when  it  was  finally  sold  in 
1907,  their  hopes  were  not  realized  and  they  profited  only 
$20,680. 

In  1899  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.,  Wagon  Mound,  invested  in  a 
new  business  venture  to  be  known  initially  as  G.  W.  Bond  & 
Bro.  (later  as  Bond  &  Wiest)  and  located  at  Cabra  Springs, 
New  Mexico,  on  the  Beck  Grant  discussed  above.22  This 
branch,  in  partnership  with  A.  W.  Wiest,  is  examined  in  de- 
tail elsewhere,23  but  like  the  Beck  Grant,  this  store  invest- 
ment was  transferred  from  the  Wagon  Mound  books  at  the 
time  of  reorganization  in  1904,  being  moved  directly  to  the 
capital  structure  of  the  Bond  &  Wiest  Company.  Thus,  from 
the  first  expansion  of  the  Bond  interests  in  Espanola  to  the 
Wagon  Mound  area,  there  arose  the  third  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro. 
store  in  New  Mexico. 

The  fourth  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  establishment  also  evolved 


18.  Letter  of  Hugh  Loudon  to  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.,  February  3,  1900,  Bond  Papers, 
loc.  cit. 

19.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

20.  Ibid. 

21.  Copy  Book,  February  10,  1906,  p.  550    (in  the  files  of  Bond  &  Wiest,  Cuervo, 
New  Mexico). 

22.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

23.  Infra,  chap  v. 


148  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

directly  from  the  Wagon  Mound  business  and  was  located  in 
Roy,  New  Mexico,  a  village  of  about  300  inhabitants  in  Mora 
County  on  the  Dawson  Railway  running  between  Dawson, 
New  Mexico,  and  Tucumcari.24  This  branch  was  put  in  some- 
time between  1900  and  1903,  the  exact  date  being  undeter- 
mined. However,  since  the  town  was  established  by  Frank 
and  William  Roy  in  1902,25  the  Bonds  must  have  opened  up 
there  either  late  in  1902  or  early  in  1903,  and  at  the  end  of 
1903  the  accounts  reflect  an  investment  in  buildings  at  Roy 
in  the  amount  of  $6,537.24.  This  investment,  along  with  the 
sheep,  Cabra  store,  and  the  Beck  Grant  were  transferred 
from  the  Wagon  Mound  books  during  the  1904  reorganiza- 
tion, and  no  further  trace  of  the  Roy  property  has  been  found. 
However,  it  was  not,  like  the  other  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  estab- 
lishments, a  mercantile  store.  Rather  it  appears  to  have 
included  only  sheep  facilities  and  range,  there  being  some 
2,854  sheep  on  rent  there  to  George  Gonzales  from  1907 
through  1910.26 

During  this  era  an  unsolved  mystery  appears  among  the 
Bond  records.  It  is  in  the  form  of  a  statement  of  the  Dozier 
Curio  business  for  the  year  1903  which  is  presented  in 
Table  24  and  leaves  many  questions  completely  unanswered. 
Whether  the  Bonds  owned  a  half  interest  in  this  store  with 
C.  L.  Pollard  or  whether  the  Bonds  were  simply  a  creditor 
is  uncertain.  The  implication,  however,  is  that  they  had  a 
definite  interest  in  the  business.  No  receivable  is  shown  on 
the  books  of  any  other  Bond  store  in  existence  at  the  time, 
nor  as  a  matter  of  fact  is  the  Dozier  Curio  business  mentioned 
or  even  implied  anywhere  in  the  records.  No  one  interviewed 
had  ever  heard  of  it,  and  indeed  even  its  very  location  is  un- 
known. The  physical  position  and  appearance  of  this  state- 
ment, however,  strongly  suggests  that  this  was  a  business  in 

24.  Max  Frost  and  Paul  A.  F.  Walter   (eds.).  The  Land  of  Sunshine   (Santa  Fe: 
New  Mexican  Printing  Company,  1904),  p.  207. 

25.  New  Mexico  Folklore  Society,  New  Mexico  Place-Name  Dictionary,  First  Col- 
lection-Committee Report,  May  14,  1949,  p.  28. 

26.  Records,  loc.  eft.  Not  solved  is  the  question  of  why  there  would  be  over  $6,000  in 
a  buildings  account  if  there  were  no  store.  The  records  are  extremely  vague  on  the  point, 
and  while  the  preponderance  of  evidence  seems  to  indicate  that  there  was  no  mercantile 
establishment  at  Roy,  there  is  some  justification  for  suspecting  that  there  may  have  been 
some  kind  of  commissary  facilities  at  least. 


FRANK  BOND  149 

which  the  Bonds  did  in  fact  own  an  interest  and  concerning 
which  they  received  financial  data.  We  therefore  put  it  down 
as  being  a  part  of  the  Bond  system  which,  like  the  Bond  Sheep 
Commission  Company  and  the  Roy  branch,  have  all  but  faded 
into  a  forgotten  past. 

TABLE  24 
STATEMENT  OF  THE  DOZIER  CURIO  BUSINESS  FOR  1903" 

Assets 

Mdse  on  hand  Dec.  31,  1903  $799.09 

Book  A/c  s.  344.61 

Cash  on  hand  3.99        $1147.69 

Liabilities 

Due  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  $282.45 

Due  C.  L.  Pollard  &  Co.  487.74 

Due  other  parties  52.05 

Undivided  Profits  325.45        $1147.69 

a.  The  statement  is  given  in  the  table  in  exactly  the  same  form  as  the  original. 

By  1903,  the  Wagon  Mound  partnership  had  grown  to 
encompass  not  only  the  original  store  site  but  also  three  ware- 
house buildings  located  across  the  street  on  right-of-way 
property  belonging  to  the  Santa  Fe  Railroad.  These  three 
buildings  were  leased  from  the  railroad,  and  the  two  which 
are  still  standing  today  are  still  under  such  a  lease  arrange- 
ment.27 On  August  3,  1903,  the  store  buildings  were  sold  on 
a  Warranty  Deed  to  Simon  Vorenberg,  and  the  warehouses 
were  vacated  on  a  Quit-Claim  Deed  in  favor  of  Vorenberg.28 
The  business  was  moved  a  short  distance  to  the  north  into  a 
building  purchased  from  the  Romero  family  at  a  cost  of  ap- 
proximately $4,700.29 

Shortly  after  moving  in,  the  new  store  building  burned  to 
the  ground  in  the  first  of  several  serious  fires  the  Bonds  were 
to  suffer  and  which  served  to  make  them  highly  conscious  of 
adequate  fire  insurance  coverage  on  their  buildings,  stock, 

27.  Interview  with  Walter  Vorenberg,  Wagon  Mound,  New  Mexico,  April  27,  1957. 

28.  Deeds  dated  August  3,  1903  (in  the  files  of  Vorenberg  Bros.,  Wagon  Mound,  New 
Mexico). 

In  his  biography  of  Simon  Vorenberg,  Coan  (loc.  cit.,  p.  206)  writes:  "He  pur- 
chased the  C.  [sic]  W.  Bond  general  store  at  Wagon  Mound,"  implying  that  the  Bonds 
sold  the  stock  as  well  as  the  store  buildings  to  Vorenberg.  This  detail  is  unresolved. 

29.  Interview  with  Stuart  MacArthur. 


150  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  wool  investments.30  No  evidence  is  available  that  would 
show  whether  or  not  this  fire  was  adequately  covered  by 
insurance.  However,  since  the  real  estate  and  merchandise 
investments  do  not  appear  in  the  accounts  at  the  beginning 
of  1904,  it  can  at  least  be  assumed  that  the  loss  was  suffi- 
ciently serious  as  to  justify  their  write-off. 

The  increasing  confidence  which  the  Bonds  placed  in 
MacArthur  is  indicated  by  an  arrangement  that  was  made 
with  him  in  1898  whereby  he  was  to  receive  3  per  cent  of  the 
annual  profit.  In  that  year  this  amounted  to  $228.23,  and  the 
following  year  his  participation  in  earnings  was  increased 
to  5  per  cent,  resulting  in  credits  to  him  of  $997.02  in  1899 
and  $678.60  in  1900.  This  confidence  in  MacArthur  was  cli- 
maxed when  the  fire  loss  occasioned  the  major  reorganization 
mentioned  above  and  which  was  marked  by  the  establish- 
ment of  a  corporate  structure  to  replace  the  partnership.  The 
new  company  was  capitalized  at  $30,000  under  the  laws  of 
the  Territory  of  New  Mexico  on  June  16,  1904,  with  30,000 
shares  of  one-dollar  stock  authorized  and  issued.  Archie  Mac- 
Arthur  and  Manuel  Paltenghe  were  admitted  to  the  business, 
the  former  becoming  the  principal  stockholder.  Table  25  gives 
the  respective  interests  of  the  incorporators  at  that  time. 

TABLE  25 

A.  MACARTHUR  COMPANY  ORIGINAL  STOCKHOLDERS 

Name  Shares 

A.  MacArthur 12,000 

Manuel  Paltenghe  9,000 

G.  W.  Bond 4,500 

Frank  Bond  4,500 

Total  30,000 

G.  W.  Bond  was  elected  president  of  the  A.  MacArthur 
Company,  as  the  new  business  was  called,  with  Manuel  Pal- 
tenghe as  vice-president  and  A.  MacArthur  as  secretary, 
treasurer,  and  general  manager.  This  organization  continued 
unchanged  for  the  next  seven  and  a  half  years.  As  general 
manager,  MacArthur  was  to  be  paid  a  salary  of  $1,400  per 
year  and  had  "full  authority  to  engage  help  and  discharge 

30.  Ibid. 


FRANK  BOND  151 

same,  sign  checks,  and  do  all  business  that  would  naturally 
fall  to  the  manager  and  secretary."31  G.  W.  Bond,  who  had 
been  at  Wagon  Mound  since  the  business  was  started,  now 
turned  over  active  management  of  the  store  to  MacArthur 
and  moved  to  Trinidad,  Colorado,  where  he  continued  his 
partnership  relation  with  his  brother  and  also  entered  into 
the  investment  and  real  estate  business.  From  this  time  on- 
ward, although  he  retained  an  active  interest  in  the  various 
Bond  enterprises,  his  influence  was  felt  largely  through 
Frank  and  from  afar.  Archie  MacArthur  remained  at  Wagon 
Mound  in  active  control  of  the  business. 

In  July,  1911,  MacArthur  became  sick  and  required  major 
surgery.  Through  Dr.  Northwood,  G.  W.  Bond  proposed  that 
the  Bonds  pay  for  the  operation  and  all  the  attendant  ex- 
penses, to  which  Frank  readily  agreed,  pointing  out  that  the 
expense  should  not  be  charged  against  the  business  but 
should  be  borne  fully  by  themselves  on  a  personal  basis.32 

In  order  to  fill  the  vacancy  left  by  MacArthur,  Frank 
Bond  brought  in  a  temporary  dry  goods  manager  by  the  name 
of  Flack  from  Colorado  Springs,  and  herein  lies  another 
illustration  of  the  Bond  readiness  to  extend  special  considera- 
tion to  those  who  merited  extra  help.  Flack's  wife  was  "kind 
of  a  damned  fool — never  wants  Flack  to  be  out  of  her  sight"33 
and  so  in  order  to  get  Flack,  Bond  paid  the  travel  and  living 
expenses  of  Flack's  wife  to  and  from  Colorado  Springs  while 
he  was  on  the  assignment. 

MacArthur's  incapacitation,  of  course,  demanded  a  per- 
manent replacement  with  not  only  a  sound  background  in 
mercantile  store  management  but  also  a  thorough  knowledge 
of  sheep  and  wool  husbandry.  Such  a  replacement  was  found 
in  the  person  of  A.  W.  Wiest  who  had  been  actively  manag- 
ing the  Bond  &  Wiest  store  at  Cuervo,  so  it  was  decided  that 
he  would  move  to  Wagon  Mound,  take  over  the  management 
of  the  business  there,  and  at  the  same  time  retain  control 
of  the  Cuervo  store.34  Accordingly,  for  some  time  Andy  Wiest 

31.  Minutes  of  Board  of  Directors'  Meeting,  June  16,   1904    (in  the  files  of  the  A. 
MacArthur  Company,  Wagon  Mound,  New  Mexico). 

32.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  July  3,  1911. 

33.  Ibid.,  July  8,  1911. 

34.  Ibid. 


152  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

shuttled  between  the  two  stores  at  frequent  intervals,  man- 
aging both.35 

A.  MacArthur  died  in  February,  1912,36  just  a  few  days 
after  stock  transfers  were  effected  to  bring  A.  W.  Wiest 
formally  into  the  business.  No  positive  proof  exists,  but  cor- 
respondence between  Frank  and  George  Bond  in  1914  indi- 
cates that  the  funds  for  Wiest's  stockholdings  were  loaned 
by  the  Bonds  who  took  Wiest's  note  for  the  $7,000,  secured 
by  the  stock  certificates  and  that  later,  in  1914,  Andy  Wiest 
proposed  to  declare  a  $35,000  dividend  in  order  to  take  up 
his  indebtedness,  even  if  it  became  necessary  to  borrow 
money  in  order  to  do  it.37 

Stock  ownership  now  stood  as  displayed  in  Table  26,  and 
except  for  shifts  necessary  to  transfer  MacArthur's  interest 
to  his  heirs,  no  further  changes  were  made  during  the  period 
through  1915.  MacArthur  left  behind  him  a  widow  and  four 
children,  Mary  Catherine,  Helen  Elizabeth,  Monica  Louise, 
and  A.  Stuart.38  The  latter  now  operates  the  business  in 
Wagon  Mound. 

TABLE  26 

A.  MACARTHUR  COMPANY  STOCKHOLDERS  AS  OF 

JANUARY,  1912 

Name  Shares 

A.  MacArthur 9,000 

M.  Paltenghe 7,000 

G.  W.  Bond 3,500 

Frank  Bond 3,500 

A.  W.  Wiest 7,000' 

Total  30,000 

a.  Three  thousand  shares  were  transferred  from  MacArthur,  2,000  from  Paltenghe, 
1,000  from  G.  W.  Bond,  and  1,000  from  Frank  Bond. 

At  a  special  stockholders'  meeting  held  in  January,  1912, 
just  before  MacArthur's  death,  A.  W.  Wiest  was  elected  sec- 
retary, treasurer,  and  general  manager  while  MacArthur  was 
made  second  vice-president.  Paltenghe,  MacArthur,  and 
Wiest  were  authorized  salaries  of  $1,800  per  year,  G.  W. 

35.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  April  26,  1915,  p.  650. 

86.  Interview  with  Stuart  MacArthur. 

87.  Letter  Book  No.  8,  January  10,  1914  ;  Letter  Book  No.  51,  January  28,  1914,  p.  59. 
38.  Stock  Certificate  No.  11    (in  the  files  of  the  A.  MacArthur  Company,  Wagon 

Mound.  New  Mexico). 


FRANK  BOND  153 

Bond  receiving  nothing  as  president  since  he  was  now  living 
in  Boise,  Idaho.39 

The  combination  of  Andy  Wiest  and  Manuel  Paltenghe 
raised  some  personnel  problems  which  became  serious  enough 
in  early  1914  to  motivate  Wiest's  suggestion  that  Paltenghe 
be  removed.40  The  seat  of  the  difficulty  is  not  clear  but  it 
seems  to  have  stemmed  from  ill  feelings  between  them  of 
long  standing.  That  Frank  Bond  found  it  necessary  on  at 
least  one  occasion  to  extract  from  Andy  a  promise  to  leave 
whiskey  alone  implies  part  of  the  difficulty;41  on  the  other 
hand,  Frank  Bond  considered  him  a  particularly  good  finan- 
cier42 and  after  receipt  of  his  1914  statement  he  was  well 
pleased  with  Wiest's  performance.43  Neither  was  Paltenghe 
without  fault.  An  occasion  arose  in  September,  1914,  whereby 
Frank  Bond  sold  some  2,500  ewes  at  Encino  which  had  pre- 
viously been  mouthed  by  Paltenghe  and  were  pronounced  to 
be  young  ewes.  Examination  later  revealed  that  706  head 
were  old  ewes,  including  150  gummers.  Bond  was  highly 
critical  of  Paltenghe,  saying : 

I  have  always  regarded  him  as  a  very  trustworthy  and  honor- 
able man,  but  I  must  say  that  I  don't  believe  that  any  man 
could  have  mouthed  that  stuff  and  left  in  so  many  old  ewes  and 
which  would  be  known  as  old  ewes  to  any  man  who  knew 
anything  at  all  about  sheep.44 

Since  in  Bond's  opinion  both  men  had  shortcomings  as  well 
as  strong  points,  the  difficulty,  while  serious,  was  probably 
one  of  personality  conflict. 

Frank  Bond  felt  that  all  stockholders  must  be  subordi- 
nated to  the  consideration  that  there  must  be  harmony  at 
Wagon  Mound,  and  he  seriously  considered  the  possibility  of 
a  separate  sheep  company,  not  handling  lambs  or  wool,  with 
himself,  George,  and  Manuel  Paltenghe  as  partners,  that 
would  net  about  12  per  cent  on  their  investment.  This  would 

39.  Minutes  of  Special  Stockholders'  Meeting,  January  24,  1912   (in  the  files  of  the 
A.  MacArthur  Company,  Wagon  Mound,  New  Mexico). 

40.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  January  10,  1914. 

41.  Ibid.,  February  23,  1914. 

42.  Letter  Book  No.  51,  January  28,  1914,  p.  59. 

43.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  January  19,  1915,  p.  533. 

44.  Letter  Book  No.  55,  September  30,  1914,  p.  346. 


154  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

have  had  the  effect  of  separating  Paltenghe  from  the  Wagon 
Mound  business  and  at  the  same  time  make  room  for  Joe  Hoi- 
brook  to  come  into  Wagon  Mound  from  the  Bond  &  Wiest 
store  at  Cuervo,  a  move  recommended  by  Wiest.45  It  was 
suggested  that  Manuel  Paltenghe  could  live  somewhere  else 
and  visit  the  sheep  camps  once  a  month  or  so,46  but  none  of 
these  arrangements  materialized  and  Paltenghe  continued 
to  hold  his  7,000  shares  of  stock  for  another  twenty-five 
years.  However,  it  was  undoubtedly  from  these  considera- 
tions that  the  Bond  Sheep  Commission  Company  developed 
and  came  into  existence. 

The  Bond  Sheep  Commission  Company  was  set  up  as  a 
joint  venture  of  the  A.  Mac  Arthur  Company,  Wagon  Mound, 
and  the  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  Mercantile  Company  of  Encino, 
New  Mexico.  Since  G.  W.  Bond  and  Frank  Bond  were  the 
major  stockholders  in  the  store  at  Encino  (L.  F.  Nohl  held 
only  one  share),  the  parties  at  interest  in  the  Bond  Sheep 
Commission  Company  were  G.  W.  Bond,  Frank  Bond,  A.  W. 
Wiest,  and  Manuel  Paltenghe.  It  was  organized  in  1913  for 
the  purpose  of  buying  a  large  herd  of  sheep  as  an  investment. 
In  June,  1914,  Frank  Bond  wrote  to  Will  McClure  in  An- 
tonito,  Colorado,  saying  that  they  had  bred  these  particular 
sheep  for  a  year  "and  are  now  cleaning  up  and  dividing  the 
profits."47  At  the  time  of  writing  the  flock  amounted  to  4,000 
ewes  and  3,200  lambs,  a  total  of  7,200  sheep.48  It  was  from 
this  herd  that  the  2,500  sheep  were  mouthed  by  Paltenghe 
and  sold  at  Encino.49  After  the  venture  was  completed  some- 
time in  1914,  the  company  ceased  to  exist  and  passed  into 
history  along  with  the  Dozier  Curio  business  as  one  of  the 
shortest-lived  and  least  known  of  the  Bond  enterprises.  It  was 
probably  a  profitable  one,  but  no  record  remains  to  show  its 
overall  result. 

Profitwise,  the  Wagon  Mound  business  was  successful 
right  from  the  very  start  in  1893,  realizing  a  profit  of  $6,- 
123.64  during  the  very  first  year  of  operation,  representing 

45.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  January  10,  1914  ;  ibid.,  January  20,  1914. 

46.  Ibid.,  January  20,  1914. 

47.  Letter  Book  No.  53,  June  12,  1914,  p.  41. 

48.  Ibid. 

49.  Letter  Book  No.  55,  September  30,  1914,  p.  355. 


FRANK  BOND  155 

a  return  of  about  20  per  cent  on  the  total  family  interest.50 
During  ten  of  the  eleven  years  of  partnership,  the  business 
earned  for  the  two  brothers  a  total  of  $168,000,  an  average 
of  $8,400  per  year  to  each  of  the  partners  from  this  one  store 
alone. 

Even  though  capital  investments  in  the  Wagon  Mound 
venture  came  from  three  sources  and  in  varying  amounts, 
profits  were  divided  evenly  and  credited  to  George  and  Frank 
Bond,  none  flowing  back  through  the  parent  business  to  be 
reflected  as  income  from  an  investment  by  the  Espanola  firm. 

Table  27  compares  the  investment  the  Bonds  had  in  the 
business  from  1893  through  1903  both  in  terms  of  their  part- 
nership account  and  in  terms  of  total  investment  including 
the  capital  support  supplied  from  Espanola.  Profits  and  profit 
relationships  to  financial  interest  are  shown,  both  with  re- 
spect to  the  proprietary  accounts  and  to  the  total  capital 
structure. 

The  profit  picture  after  incorporation  is  unfortunately 
not  so  clear  because  profits  for  all  years  are  not  available. 
Table  28  shows  the  undivided  profits  for  each  of  the  twelve 
years  from  1904  through  1915,  but  since  the  stockholders 
distributed  profits  to  themselves  in  undetermined  amounts, 
the  data  presented  do  not  reflect  earnings.  Even  disregarding 
the  profit  distributions  that  must  have  taken  place  from  time 
to  time,  the  increase  in  undivided  profits  during  this  period 
indicates  an  average  increase  of  $11,500  annually.  However, 
it  must  be  borne  in  mind  that  after  1904,  the  Bonds  only  re- 
ceived roughly  one-fourth  of  the  dividends.  The  profits  for 
some  years  are  known,  however,  and  they  provide  an  indica- 
tion that  the  corporate  period  under  MacArthur  and  Wiest 
was  every  bit  as  successful  as  was  the  previous  period  under 
the  managership  of  G.  W.  Bond.  The  available  data  are  also 
included  in  Table  28. 


50.  Records,  loc.  cit. 


156 


NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 


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FRANK  BOND  157 

TABLE  28 

EARNINGS  AND  UNDIVIDED  PROFITS 
AT  WAGON  MOUND,  1904-1915 

(dollars  in  thousands) 


Year 

Undivided  Profit 
at  End  of  Year 

Profit 
for  Year 

1904 

$      9.9 

$.    .    . 

1905 

23.3 

.    .    . 

1906 

39.8 

.    .    . 

1907 

53.8 

.    .    . 

1908 

66.3 

12.3 

1909 

86.7 

... 

1910 

69.8 

.  .  . 

1911 

84.1 

.  .  . 

1912 

115.8 

31.7 

1913 

117.7 

39.7 

1914 

138.2 

26.3 

1915 

138.4 

34.3 

None  of  the  profit  figures  shown  in  Table  28  include  allow- 
ances for  bad  debts  or  for  depreciation  since  it  was  not  until 
1913  that  refinements  in  the  bookkeeping-  system  provided 
for  these  expenses  on  a  formal  basis.  Beginning  in  1913,  these 
reserve  accounts  were  referred  to  as  "Sinking  Funds  .  .  .  de- 
ducted and  set  to  one  side  to  protect  any  depreciation  and 
loss  that  may  occur."51  They  amounted  to  $12,254.41  by  the 
end  of  1915. 

Table  29  tabulates  the  profits  for  the  years  1912  through 
1915  by  type  of  activity  and  presents  an  outline  of  the  type 
of  business  activities  carried  on  during  those  years  and  the 
relative  importance  of  each. 


61.  Ibid. 


158  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

TABLE  29 

WAGON  MOUND  PROFITS  BY  ACTIVITY 
(dollars  in  thousands) 


Activity 

1912 

1913 

1914 

1915 

Wool 

$  4.2 

$  3.4 

$  2.7 

$  3.1 

Sheep 

4.1 

4.3 

13.3 

15.6 

Cattle 

.2 

.7 

.4 

.1 

Hides  &  Pelts 

.2 

.3 

.3 

.3 

Interest 

3.2 

2.0 

2.5 

1.6 

Discounts 

1.7 

1.3 

1.2 

1.4 

Merchandise 

18.1 

26.9 

5.6 

11.2 

Miscellaneous  a 

.  .  . 

.8 

.3 

1.0 

Total 

$31.7 

$39.7 

$26.3 

$34.3 

a.  Includes  profit  on  rams,  cream,  and  bones. 

Just  prior  to  the  close  of  the  period  with  which  we  are 
here  concerned,  the  Bond-Connell  Sheep  and  Wool  Company 
in  Albuquerque  became  the  next  enterprise  to  spring,  at  least 
partially,  from  the  fertile  loins  of  the  Wagon  Mound  busi- 
ness, for  in  1914  the  A.  MacArthur  Company  invested  $5,000 
in  the  stock  of  the  new  venture  along  with  several  others. 
The  Bond-Connell  Sheep  and  Wool  Company  is  treated 
separately  and  in  more  detail  elsewhere  in  this  paper.52 


62.  Infra,  chap.  xiii. 


WEST  OF  THE  PECOS 

By  E.  L.  STEVE  STEPHENS 

(Concluded) 

The  next  day  Miller  had  them  boys  to  get  the  chuck  wagon 
ready  to  send  to  town  after  chuck.  In  a  couple  days  Miller 
sent  the  wagon  in  by  one  of  the  boys  and  sent  the  saddle  to 
the  man  we  borrowed  it  from  and  told  him  to  pick  my  bedroll 
up  and  bring  it  back.  We  didn't  do  much  until  the  wagon  got 
back.  We  got  the  saddle  ponies  up.  The  chuck  wagon  was 
going  on  a  cow  work  to  mark  and  brand  the  calves  and  hold 
the  fat  cows  and  the  steers.  Going  up  the  trail  to  Trinidad 
where  we  are  to  deliver  them  to.  The  chuck  wagon  in  from 
town  and  we  are  ready  to  start  the  cow  work.  It  late  in  the 
spring.  Mr.  Miller  went  back  to  Kan.  City.  We  finished  the 
cow  work  around  the  first  of  Sept.  and  we  started  our  journey 
to  deliver  the  cows  and  steers  to  Trinidad,  Colorado,  about 
Sept.  15. 

It  was  a  rough  trip  going  up  there.  So  much  rain  and  the 
Indians.  The  wagon  boss  didn't  kick  off  with  the  Indian  Chief 
so  good.  The  chief  wanted  a  fat  cow  for  his  people  to  eat  and 
the  boss  turned  him  down.  That  wasn't  good.  The  boss  didn't 
know  anything  about  Indians.  He  never  been  around  Indians 
much.  I  told  the  boss  if  he  would  let  me  handle  the  outfit  we 
could  make  it  all  right  for  I  had  lived  and  been  around  them 
15  years.  So  he  did.  So  the  next  morning  I  rode  up  to  the 
Indian's  camp  and  got  off  my  pony  and  the  chief  come  out  of 
his  teepee  with  a  rifle  in  his  hand.  I  made  him  a  few  signs.  He 
set  his  rifle  down.  I  told  him  what  I  was  going  to  do.  So  the 
chief  and  three  Indians  went  back  with  me. 

We  rode  up  to  our  wagon.  I  told  the  boss  to  have  the  cow- 
boys to  throw  the  cattle  together  so  the  boss  did.  I  and  the 
chief  rode  into  the  herd  and  I  told  the  chief  to  pick  him  out 
one  so  he  did.  I  told  the  boss  I  was  going  to  help  the  Indians 
to  their  camp  with  the  cow.  I  told  the  boss  they  could  start 
on  with  the  herd,  I  would  overtake  them.  We  made  it  to  the 
Indian  camp  all  right.  Well,  chief,  old  Pal,  I  will  go  and  over- 
take the  herd.  The  chief  shook  my  hand  and  pulled  my  hat  off 

159 


160  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  patted  me  on  the  head.  That  was  their  way  to  show  love 
and  friendship  and  said  come  back  and  see  us.  I  said  I  sure 
will  if  I  am  in  this  country,  and  I  rode  off. 

Overtaken  the  herd.  Always  one  smart  alec.  This  smart 
alec  said  to  me  we  thought  you  had  taken  up  with  an  Indian 
squaw.  I  said  to  him  no  more  wise  cracks  out  of  you.  The  boss 
said  boys,  Steve  got  us  out  of  this  jam.  This  wise  guy  had 
his  tale  [tail]  over  his  back  all  the  way  to  Trinidad  at  me.  I 
didn't  have  anything  to  say  to  him,  but  I  kept  an  eye  on  him. 
We  finally  reached  Trinidad  and  turned  the  cattle  over  to  the 
man  bought  them.  Was  a  big  wild  west  show  going  on  so  we 
stayed  there  three  days  and  taken  it  in.  We  hadn't  been  to 
town  in  seven  or  eight  months.  Our  hair  and  beards  were 
long.  We  all  got  cleaned  up  the  first  evening  and  went  to  the 
show.  And  after  the  show  was  over  we  went  to  the  dance. 

This  smart  guy  didn't  take  any  hand  in  the  dance.  But 
the  rest  of  us  cowboys  had  a  swell  time.  Some  time  after 
midnight  we  went  to  the  wagon  and  went  to  bed.  The  next 
morning  after  breakfast  the  wrangler  got  the  saddle  ponies 
in.  We  were  getting  ready  to  go  to  the  show  ground.  Some  of 
the  boys  was  going  to  enter  in  the  bronc  riding.  It  was  a  good 
show  and  a  good  dance  that  night.  The  second  day  we  was 
there  several  of  us  cow  punchers  taken  a  part  in  the  wild  west 
show.  I  was  in  the  cow  roping.  I  rope  my  cow  and  rode  back 
to  the  chute  and  got  off  my  pony.  Someone  slapped  me  on  my 
shoulder.  I  looked  around  and  it  was  Goldy  Smith.  I  hadn't 
seen  her  in  seven  years.  I  rode  against  her  in  Durango,  Colo., 
in  1907. 

We  had  lots  to  talk  about.  We  went  had  supper  together 
and  we  went  to  the  dance  and  had  a  good  time.  Goldy's  father 
was  there.  He  was  pretty  feeble.  Mr.  Smith  had  moved  to 
Trinidad.  After  the  dance  was  over  I  went  and  stayed  all 
night  with  them.  He  was  a  big  cow  man.  The  next  morning 
around  five  o'clock,  Mrs.  Smith  put  the  coffee  pot  on.  I  heard 
someone  up  so  I  got  up  and  it  was  Mrs.  Smith.  Wasn't  long 
until  the  coffee  was  ready.  She  poured  two  cups  of  coffee.  She 
carried  Mr.  Smith  coffee  to  the  bed  for  him.  I  had  drink  one 
cup  of  coffee  by  that  time  Goldy  had  got  up  and  come  through 
where  her  dad  was  in  bed.  Goldy  poured  her  a  cup.  She  said 


WEST  OF  THE  PECOS  161 

Steve,  Dad  wants  us  to  come  in  where  he  was.  Mrs.  Smith 
fixed  breakfast.  She  called  us  and  we  set  down  and  eat.  Mr. 
Smith  said,  Steve  how  about  you  working  for  me?  I  will  give 
you  a  good  job.  If  I  went  to  work  for  you  I  would  have  to  go 
back  to  the  0.  B.  and  get  my  saddle  ponies.  I  told  Mr.  Smith 
I  would  let  him  know  in  a  day  or  two. 

We  stayed  two  more  days  and  we  taken  in  the  wild  west 
show.  The  last  evening  we  was  in  Trinidad  I  saw  Mr.  Smith 
and  I  told  him  it  was  so  late  in  the  fall.  I  will  go  to  work  for 
him  in  the  spring  if  he  wanted  me  to.  He  said  that  would  be 
all  right.  So  the  chuck  wagon  and  us  cowboys  left  for  the 
ranch.  It  taken  us  three  weeks  to  reach  the  ranch.  The  boss 
paid  some  of  the  cowpunchers  and  they  went  to  town  and 
waited  for  the  next  spring  work  so  they  could  get  a  job.  The 
big  part  of  the  cowpunchers  just  work  spring  and  fall.  So  the 
boss  kept  four  of  us  cowpunchers  counting  that  smart  alec. 
Well  the  winter  wasn't  so  bad.  Well,  spring  was  here  and  the 
grass  was  putting  out. 

One  day  the  boss  and  I  was  riding  along  together.  I  told 
him  I  was  going  to  quit.  He  said  Steve,  I  wish  you  would 
stay  on.  I  got  my  saddle  pony  and  my  pack  pony  up  to  feed 
them  a  few  days  so  they  could  make  the  trip  all  right.  I  had 
the  ponies  up  three  or  four  days  and  this  smart  guy  left  the 
gate  open  and  they  got  out.  I  said  to  him  why  did  you  let 
my  ponies  out?  You  go  and  get  them  ponies  and  put  them  in 
the  lot.  When  I  want  them  out  I  will  turn  them  out.  He  got 
his  tail  over  his  back.  I  said  to  him,  you  keep  on  you  might 
get  the  cuckle  burrs  combed  out  of  your  tail.  The  boss  was 
standing  there  taking  all  in. 

About  the  middle  of  April  I  saddled  up  and  packed  the 
other  pony  and  pulled  out.  The  second  day  I  reached  Ft.  Bar- 
clay. There  was  where  I  reached  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  and 
travelled  to  Raton.  I  put  my  ponies  in  the  stage  coach  barn 
and  taken  the  stage  coach  for  Trinidad  to  see  Mr.  Smith.  I 
found  Mr.  Smith  sick.  I  stayed  several  days.  I  believe  it  made 
him  feel  better  to  see  me. 

He  said  to  me,  Steve,  you  didn't  fool  me.  He  asked  me 
where  did  I  leave  my  ponies.  I  said  in  Raton.  We  talked  three 
days.  He  told  me  all  about  the  ranch.  He  had  sold  the  cattle 


162  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  the  ranch,  but  would  turn  it  over  now.  Be  about  8  months 
before  I  will.  I  want  you  to  go  down  and  take  it  over.  I  asked 
Mr.  Smith  who  are  running  it.  Now,  I  said,  Mr.  Smith,  it's 
not  a  good  policy  for  a  stranger  to  go  on  a  job  and  take  over 
if  the  owner  are  not  there.  I  don't  want  to  go  down  and  have 
any  trouble  with  the  boss.  He  said  I  have  sent  for  him  to 
come  to  see  me.  I  said  what  are  the  matter  ?  He  said  haven't 
branded  as  many  calves  as  they  should. 

I  stayed  around  Trinidad  until  his  boss  come  in.  I  never 
did  see  him.  Mr.  Smith  told  me  what  he  wanted  me  to  do  and 
where  I  could  get  anything  for  the  ranch  I  needed  at  Raton, 
N.  M.  All  the  time  I  was  there  I  stayed  in  their  home.  I  said 
to  Mr.  Smith  one  night  I  guess  in  the  morning  I  will  take  the 
stage  coach  and  go  to  Raton  and  get  my  ponies  and  go  to  the 
ranch.  When  I  was  ready  to  take  the  coach,  Mr.  Smith  said, 
Steve,  when  I  get  well  I  will  see  you.  I  arrived  in  Raton  the 
next  day  and  stayed  all  night. 

The  next  day  I  left  for  the  ranch.  The  ranch  (brand  CT) 
was  about  half  way  from  Maxwell  and  Springer  on  the  Red 
River.  I  travelled  down  the  old  Santa  Fe  Trail  to  Cimarron 
then  quit  the  trail,  turned  east.  The  evening  of  the  third  day 
I  rode  up  to  the  ranch.  Was  two  cowpunchers  come  out  the 
door.  One  said  get  down  stranger.  I  got  off  and  wrapped  my 
bridle  reins  around  the  hitching  pole  and  went  in.  They  had 
some  coffee  made.  I  drank  a  cup.  Them  buttons  didn't  have 
much  to  say.  I  am  going  to  unsaddle  my  pony.  I  untied  my 
bedroll  and  pulled  it  off  my  pack  pony.  They  looked  at  each 
other  and  started  leading  my  ponies  to  the  lot  so  they  followed 
me.  I  unsaddled  and  put  them  in  the  lot.  I  seen  some  feed  so 
I  fed  them.  All  time  I  was  looking  around  after  a  while  one 
said  us  go  and  fix  supper.  We  went  to  the  house.  I  asked  would 
it  be  all  right  for  me  to  put  my  bedroll  in  the  house.  Yes,  they 
said. 

They  started  fixing  supper.  Didn't  have  much  to  fix. 
Didn't  have  any  beef  and  not  much  bacon.  We  eat  what  they 
cooked.  After  supper  one  said  to  me  do  you  want  your  horses 
turned  out?  No  just  leave  them  in  the  lot.  The  next  morning 
they  fixed  breakfast.  We  eat  and  one  drove  some  ponies  up 
and  put  them  in  the  corral  and  caught  them  a  horse  each.  Was 


WEST  OF  THE  PECOS  163 

a  good  looking  dun  pony  in  the  bunch.  I  said  who  rides  him. 
One  said  the  boss  was  here  rode  him.  I  said  where  is  he?  He 
quit  and  left  the  other  day.  I  said  to  them  cow  pokes  how 
about  me  riding  him  ?  You  can  I  guess.  He  may  buck  all  time 
I  was.  I  had  a  eye  on  them  guys.  I  said  to  them  how  many 
ponies  you  all  have  in  you  all  mount?  They  told  me.  How 
many  in  the  lot  the  boss  rode.  Mr.  Smith  had  told  me  how 
many  saddle  ponies  he  had  on  the  ranch. 

I  went  with  them  pokes  that  day.  I  seen  some  big  calves. 
Wasn't  branded.  I  said  Who  them  calves  belong  to?  Better 
brand  them,  they  might  get  wandered  off  from  their  mothers. 
No  one  said  anything.  I  let  on  like  I  could  read  the  brand 
was  on  them  calves  mother.  We  returned  to  the  ranch  house 
late  in  the  evening.  We  made  some  coffee.  Later  we  cooked 
dinner  and  supper  both  in  one.  Wasn't  much  to  cook  at  this 
outfit.  We  was  eating.  I  asked  who  have  been  taking  the  chuck 
wagon  to  town  after  chuck  ?  One  said  I  have,  went  twice.  Was 
no  more  said  about  that.  I  found  out  what  I  wanted  to  know 
that  day. 

The  next  morning  while  we  was  eating  breakfast  I  said 
boys,  Mr.  Smith  sent  me  down  here  to  run  this  ranch  and 
I  am  going  to  run  it  to  suit  me.  After  breakfast  I  said  boys 
we  are  going  to  get  the  chuck  wagon  ready  to  go  to  town.  Up 
to  now  I  never  told  them  my  name.  They  said  what  are  your 
name.  I  said  Steve.  They  looked  at  each  other.  I  asked  them 
ruckes  [rookies]  their  name.  One  was  Paul  and  the  other  was 
John.  That  night  I  told  Paul  in  the  morning  I  want  you  to 
take  the  chuck  wagon  and  go  to  Raton  and  get  chuck  and 
horse  feed.  I  made  out  a  list  for  him  to  get.  The  next  morn- 
ing I  started  him  out  for  town.  The  wagon  was  gone  8  days. 

The  next  day  after  I  sent  the  wagon  to  town  I  said  John 
us  go  up  to  Cisco  Spring.  I  wanted  to  look  around.  Was  an 
old  adobe  house  set  back  up  in  a  canyon  a  little  way  from  the 
spring.  I  had  been  there  one  time  before  but  didn't  get  off 
my  pony  then.  So  we  rode  up  and  got  off.  I  kept  my  hand  on 
my  gun.  You  could  tell  might  be  a  wild  cat  jump  out.  I  was 
looking  around.  Was  several  short  pieces  of  rope  hanging 
down  from  a  limb  in  a  large  tree.  I  walked  around  the  sod 
shanty.  Wasn't  but  one  door  in  it  and  two  small  look  out 


164  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

holes.  The  door  was  fastened  with  a  horse  shoe  bent  together 
on  the  outside.  I  looked  around  and  found  something  to  pry 
the  horse  shoe  apart  and  went  in.  Wasn't  much  in  the  house. 
Some  old  pans  and  two  pair  of  boots,  one  pair  had  Wild  Bill 
on  them  and  the  other  pair  said  Cisco.  It  sain  on  the  boots 
June  1900.  It  was  carved  with  a  knife  and  I  kicked  the  junk 
around  and  found  a  cow  horn  was  burned  on.  This  what  it 
said.  We  are  staying  here  is  1895.  All  the  time  I  was  in  there 
John  was  a  little  nervous.  I  said,  John,  have  you  ever  been 
in  here.  I  said  I  never  was  in  there.  I  have  worked  for  Mr. 
Smith  a  year.  This  is  the  third  time  I  have  ever  been  at  the 
shack. 

I  shut  the  door  and  we  rode  off.  I  never  did  say  what  I 
saw  in  there.  We  pulled  out  on  the  way  to  the  ranch.  When 
we  left  the  ranch  I  went  to  look  for  a  fat  calf  to  butcher  for 
the  ranch.  We  were  riding  down  a  canyon  and  run  into  a 
bunch  of  cattle.  Was  a  cow  with  a  fat  calf  by  her  side.  I  told 
John  us  carry  this  cow  and  calf  in.  He  didn't  ask  any  ques- 
tions. We  drove  them  on  to  the  ranch  and  put  them  in  the 
corral  and  tied  the  gate  good.  I  sure  was  hungry. 

We  went  to  the  house  and  we  started  fixing  dinner  and 
supper  together.  That's  the  way  we  cooked.  The  next  morning 
I  said,  John,  us  butcher  that  calf.  He  looked  at  me  but  didn't 
say  a  word.  We  butchered  the  calf  and  hung  it  on  the  side  of 
the  house.  We  had  steak  and  gravy  then.  We  drug  the  intrails 
off  that  night.  I  thought  every  wild  cat  and  every  lion  every 
panther  in  the  country  was  there.  They  growled  and  fought 
all  night.  Way  in  the  night  John  called  me.  I  never  did  hear 
anything  like  that  before.  I  said  John,  they  are  filled  up.  Next 
morning  John  and  I  went  down  where  they  were.  Hair  and 
fuzz  were  all  around  there.  John  said  something  got  tore  up. 
I  said  maybe  so. 

In  a  few  days  Paul  come  in  with  the  chuck  wagon.  We 
unloaded  the  chuck  and  horse  feed.  I  told  the  boys  to  put  the 
chuck  box  and  the  sheet  and  bows  on  the  wagon.  I  will  be 
back  in  two  or  three  days.  I  am  going  and  get  us  a  cook  over 
east  of  the  ranch  about  10  or  11  miles.  Was  a  Mexican  settle- 
ment. Vermejo  Creek  valley.  I  figured  I  could  get  a  cook  over 
there.  I  rode  up  to  a  very  nice  house.  A  man  walked  out  of  the 


WEST  OF  THE  PECOS  165 

house  and  told  me  to  get  down  and  told  me  to  come  in  so  I  went 
in  and  his  wife  poured  us  some  coffee.  I  asked  him  where  can 
I  find  a  man  would  cook  for  a  chuck  wagon.  I  need  one  for 
a  few  days.  Yes  I  do.  He  has  been  cooking  for  a  sheep  wagon. 
So  he  and  I  went  and  seen  him.  This  man  went  with  me.  Told 
him  to  come  up  to  my  place  in  the  morning.  I  stayed  the  night 
with  this  Mexican.  He  had  two  good  looking  girls.  After  sup- 
per the  girls  sang  and  played  the  guitar.  The  next  morning 
my  cook  was  there.  At  the  table  he  told  me  he  would  come 
over  and  help  me  work.  I  and  my  cook  pulled  out  for  the 
ranch.  This  Mexican  was  riding  a  pony  and  leading  a  burro 
with  his  bed  on  it. 

It  was  late  in  the  evening  when  we  got  to  the  ranch.  I  told 
the  boys  to  go  and  bring  the  saddle  horses  in.  They  still  didn't 
know  what  we  was  going  to  do.  I  hadn't  told  them  we  was 
going  to  brand  them  big  calves  they  failed  to  brand.  The  Mexi- 
can I  went  to  see  come  and  brought  two  more  hands.  We 
pulled  out  south  about  15  miles  and  camped  next  day.  We 
started  gathering  them  gib  calves  marking  and  branding. 
We  camped  there  three  days.  Then  we  moved  back  north  a 
few  miles.  We  worked  that  country  then  moved  again.  By 
this  time  we  were  close  to  the  ranch.  We  pulled  the  chuck 
wagon  into  the  ranch  and  we  worked  from  the  ranch.  We 
finally  finished.  It  was  a  rough  job,  but  I  figured  it  would  be. 

By  this  time  it  was  late  in  the  fall.  Mr.  Smith  come  down 
and  stayed  a  few  days.  Then  I  carried  him  to  the  Santa  Fe 
Trail  and  put  him  on  the  stage  coach  and  he  went  back  home 
to  Trinidad.  The  snow  began  falling  early  this  winter  but 
everything  wintered  very  good. 

The  first  of  May  just  around  the  corner  and  then  was 
when  the  work  began.  One  morning  one  of  my  cowboys  got 
bucked  off  and  broke  his  leg.  I  splint  it  up  the  best  I  could. 
Was  a  Mexican  doctor  in  that  settlement  where  my  Mexican 
friend  lived.  I  told  the  boy  to  stay  here  with  the  boy  got  his 
leg  broke  and  I  would  go  and  get  the  doctor.  I  went  in  a  hurry 
and  the  doctor  came  back  with  me.  He  taken  the  splints  off 
I  put  on  and  he  looked  at  it  good  and  put  some  dope  on,  then 
he  had  some  splints  he  had  made.  He  done  it  up  in  good  shape. 

In  about  a  month  he  was  hobbling  around.  About  time  I 


166  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

hadn't  heard  from  Mr.  Smith.  Time  was  just  about  up  to  turn 
the  ranch  and  cattle  over  to  the  man  bought  the  outfit.  In  a 
day  or  two  here  come  that  Blow  Joe  and  brought  four  city 
cowboys  with  him.  Didn't  do  anything  the  first  day.  Mr. 
Smith  came  in  that  evening.  The  next  morning  I  told  my  boys 
to  find  the  horses.  Mr.  Smith  and  I  was  talking.  I  saw  them 
city  cowboys  go  in  the  corral  with  their  ropes  in  their  hands. 
I  went  down  to  the  corral.  I  said  I  will  do  the  roping  here. 
My  pet  dun  Pony  [,]  the  first  pony  I  rode  on  this  ranch [,] 
was  a  smart  guy  said  to  me  I  am  going  to  ride  that  dun.  I 
said  you  ride  any  one  I  tell  you  to.  I  am  still  the  boss.  He 
said  I  come  down  here  to  be  the  boss.  I  said  look  here,  drug 
store  cowboy,  you  are  going  to  do  what  I  tell  you  to  do. 

Mr.  Smith  told  that  buyer  he  would  have  to  get  him  a 
cook  so  he  put  one  of  his  city  cowboys  cooking.  Didn't  have 
much  to  eat.  One  said  to  one  of  my  cowboys  do  that  boss  wear 
that  gun  all  thim  [time].  Yes  he  does.  Where  is  he  from? 
This  boy  said  I  don't  know.  What  is  his  name?  Steve  is  all 
I  know. 

We  got  along  very  will.  Turned  the  cattle  and  the  ranch 
over  and  Mr.  Smith  went  back  home  in  a  day  or  so.  I  saddled 
up  that  good  dun  pony  and  pack  one  and  turned  it  to  them. 
I  don't  know  how  they  will  come  out  in  that  country.  They  had 
never  been  in  the  west. 

I  rode  across  the  mountain  to  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  and 
travelled  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  to  Raton  and  I  put  my  ponies 
in  the  coach  yard  and  told  the  man  to  take  care  of  them  until 
I  get  back.  I  taken  the  stage  to  Trinidad  to  see  Mr.  and  Mrs. 
Smith  and  Goldy.  I  stayed  around  Trinidad  a  few  days  and 
went  back  to  Raton.  I  was  there  a  few  days  I  run  into  Miller. 
He  owns  the  101  ranch.  He  was  on  his  way  to  the  ranch.  He 
asked  me  to  go  with  him.  I  had  workfed]  for  the  101.  I  said 
I  will  go  with  him.  So  we  taken  the  stage  to  San  Juan  Pueblo 
that  on  the  Rio  Grande.  The  foreman  had  the  buck  board 
there  to  meet  Miller.  It  was  late  in  the  day  when  we  left  San 
Juan.  We  had  to  stay  one  night  on  our  way  to  the  ranch.  We 
drove  in  the  next  day.  Was  several  cowboys  around  there. 
I  set  around  and  listened  at  them  shoot  the  bull  and  brag  on 
themselves.  What  they  done  the  last  show  the  101  pulled  off. 


WEST  OF  THE  PECOS  167 

That  gave  me  the  belly  ache.  They  asked  me  how  long  have 
you  been  in  this  country?  I  said  a  few  days.  Are  you  going  to 
work  in  this  country?  I  said  maybe.  The  cook  ring  the  bell 
for  supper.  They  made  a  bull  run.  I  walked  up  and  got  me  a 
tin  plate  and  a  tin  cup.  Got  some  coffee  and  filled  my  plate 
with  red  beans  and  some  steak.  Went  and  set  down  and  was 
eating.  Miller  and  his  foreman  come  over  where  I  was.  Miller 
said,  Steve,  this  is  my  foreman,  Straton.  He  said  a  few  words. 
I  said  yes  or  no.  I  figured  that  outfit  out.  The  next  morning 
they  was  saddling  up  the  straw  boss  asked  me  if  I  wanted 
to  go  with  them.  No,  I  will  hang  around  here.  They  sure  had 
ranhand  horses.  Could  be  no  other  way  the  bunch  rode  them. 
We  was  there  a  week.  Miller  asked  me  was  I  going  to  work 
for  him.  I  don't  think  I  will.  I  believe  I  will  go  east  a  little 
ways. 

The  foreman  carried  us  back  to  San  Juan  and  we  taken 
the  stage  coach  and  I  stopped  off  at  Raton.  Stayed  round  there 
a  few  days.  I  left  there  went  a  southeast  and  hit  the  old 
Goodnight  Trail.  Travelled  down  it  to  old  Fort  Roy  [town] 
where  the  Goodnight  Trail  and  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  cross  each 
other.  Then  I  travelled  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  to  Pasamonte.  I 
stopped  over  a  few  days  and  let  my  ponies  rest  their  feet. 
Was  tender.  Travelling  was  bad.  So  I  stopped  there  put  my 
pony  up  and  fed  them.  Walked  up  to  a  cafe  to  get  a  cup  of 
coffee  and  a  bite  to  eat.  Was  a  rawhide  town  not  much  there 
but  saloons  and  gambling  joints.  I  asked  that  girl  waited  on 
me  was  this  a  pretty  good  town.  She  said  at  times  the  sheep 
herders  and  a  few  miners  from  the  Raton  Pass  country  was 
in  town. 

The  first  night  I  was  there  was  so  bad.  All  them  miners 
and  thugs  and  pimps  was  gambling.  The  ones  was  gambling 
was  dancing  with  the  girls.  Long  in  the  night  was  four 
strange  hard  lookers  show  up  in  where  they  was  gambling. 
After  a  while  one  walked  up  to  the  dice  table  and  another  set 
down  to  the  poker  table.  The  other  two  just  stood  around. 
I  kept  an  eye  on  them.  You  didn't  know  what  would  take 
place.  I  figured  they  would  hold  the  joint  up.  Everything  went 
off.  Not  much  trouble  that  night.  But  the  next  night  the  same 
four  and  two  more  walked  in  the  same  cave.  Two  went  to 


168  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

gambling.  The  rest  of  them  danced  with  the  gals.  Some,  but 
didn't  stay  in  where  the  girls  was  long.  Come  back  in  the 
saloon  where  they  was  gambling.  Some  time  after  midnight 
a  racket  started  in  the  dance  hall.  It  was  getting  rough  in 
there.  The  pimps  began  to  go  in  there  and  began  to  get  up 
from  the  tables.  About  that  time  some  of  the  lights  was  shot 
out.  Some  one  said  nobody  make  a  move.  You  won't  get  hurt. 
The  place  was  held  up  and  robbed.  I  backed  against  the  wall 
close  to  the  door  and  seen  one  of  the  six  men  rake  the  money 
in  a  saddle  bag  and  they  backed  out  the  door.  Then  they  was 
in  the  dark. 

I  went  down  to  the  cafe  to  get  a  cup  of  coffee.  A  man  come 
in  look  like  someone  had  worked  him  over  with  a  bottle.  That 
girl  brought  me  my  coffee  was  you  up  there  when  it  was 
robbed.  That  was  fun  to  me.  I  am  used  to  that.  I  asked  her 
how  long  she  been  here.  Several  months.  Me  and  my  man 
come  here  from  Grants.  How  long  was  you  in  Grants?  Two 
years,  she  said.  She  said  I  have  seen  you  in  Grants.  Or  in 
Bluewater,  haven't  I.  Maybe  I  said.  That  girl  said  she  was  in 
that  place  when  the  Mexican  had  trouble  with  that  gal  tried 
to  steal  his  money  when  he  was  in  her  room  and  you  went 
in  there  and  I  seen  you  shake  her  and  her  man  started  in  and 
you  knocked  him  out  the  door.  She  said  you  like  that  Mexican. 
Yes,  I  did.  He  worked  for  me  two  years. 

I  stayed  around  there  a  few  more  days.  I  decided  to  go 
a  little  farther  southeast.  I  pulled  out  one  morning.  Headed 
to  Tucumcari.  I  travelled  one  day.  Came  up  on  a  cow  camp 
and  stayed  all  night  with  a  cow  puncher.  The  next  morning 
this  cowpuncher  told  me  where  I  could  run  into  an  old  trail 
that  went  to  one  of  the  Bell  camps.  I  made  it  just  before  sun- 
down. That  was  a  wild  country.  I  had  seen  a  little  of  every- 
thing that  day.  I  stayed  all  night  there  was  two  cowboys 
there.  We  was  eating  supper  I  asked  what  cow  camp  this  was. 
They  said  the  Bell  camp.  I  asked  them  cowboys  where  does 
this  trail  lead  to?  They  said  to  the  Bell  headquarters.  I  pulled 
out. 

I  hadn't  been  gone  over  two  hours  I  saw  a  man  cross  the 
trail  ahead  of  me.  I  didn't  know  what  he  was  up  to.  I  never  did 
see  him  any  more.  I  rode  on  down  the  trail.  All  of  a  sudden 


WEST  OF  THE  PECOS  169 

my  dun  pony  I  was  riding  begin  snorting  and  stepping  high. 
There  were  two  panthers  laying  on  a  bluff.  I  didn't  want  to 
kill  one  of  them.  Something  else  might  bob  up.  The  country 
was  full  of  outlaws.  I  went  on  down  the  trail.  Just  before  I 
got  to  the  ranch  I  saw  a  man  coming  down  a  canyon.  He  was 
a  Bell  cowboy.  We  rode  on  to  the  ranch.  Got  down  and  went 
in  the  house. 

The  boss  and  two  cow  punchers  was  drinking  coffee.  Their 
hair  and  beards  were  long.  I  got  me  a  tin  cup  and  poured 
me  a  cup.  I  noticed  they  looked  me  over.  I  kept  one  eye  on 
them.  When  I  walked  in  I  knew  I  had  seen  one  of  them  guys. 
I  figured  out  where.  I  seen  him  in  Durango  in  1908  at  a  wild 
west  show.  But  he  didn't  seem  to  recognize  me.  The  boss 
asked  me  do  you  want  to  work.  I  said  maybe.  Nobody  asked 
me  my  name  and  I  didn't  ask  them  theirs.  I  had  been  there 
about  ten  days  one  night  the  boss  said  to  me  what  are  your 
name?  I  said  Steve.  I  had  learned  their  names  by  this  time. 
That  cowboy  I  knew  when  I  first  went  in  he  said  to  me.  I 
believe  I  have  seen  you  before.  I  said  maybe.  I  never  told 
him  where  I  seen  him.  The  least  you  talk  the  better  off  you 
are.  That  day  and  time. 

I  worked  there  nearly  two  years.  I  found  out  what  I  had 
been  looking  for  seven  years.  One  morning  I  told  the  boss 
I  believe  I  would  hunt  a  new  range.  I  saddled  up  my  dun  pony 
and  packed  the  other  one  and  rode  off  and  led  my  pack  pony. 
There  was  a  trail  leading  southeast  and  come  into  the  old 
Goodnight  Trail  and  travelled  down  it  to  Fort  Butler  and 
stayed  over  night  there.  And  decided  to  hang  around  there 
a  few  days  but  didn't  stay  there  two  days.  I  travelled  down 
the  old  Goodnight  Trail  and  come  up  on  a  big  sheep  ranch. 
Was  one  white  man  and  four  Mexican  sheep  herders.  I  stayed 
all  night.  They  had  a  big  pot  of  brown  beans  cooked.  One 
Mexican  warmed  the  beans  and  made  some  bread  and  made 
some  coffee  and  fried  some  venison.  They  treated  me  very 
nice.  They  never  asked  me  anything  and  I  didn't  tell  them 
anything. 

I  travelled  down  the  trail  to  Fort  Sumner.  I  put  my  ponies 
in  the  wagon  yard  and  looked  the  doby  town  over.  It  was  full 
of  sheep  herders  and  a  few  cow  pokes.  I  went  in  a  barber  shop 


170  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

to  get  cleaned  up.  Thought  I  would  make  a  honk  a  tonk  and 
look  the  gals  over.  I  got  cleaned  up  and  walked  out  on  the 
dirt  sidewalk  about  that  time  some  body  knocked  a  man  out 
the  saloon  door.  It  looked  like  Arizona  to  me.  I  walked  up 
there  and  walked  in.  I  walked  up  to  the  bar  and  ordered  a 
drink.  Hadn't  drunk  a  drop  in  five  years.  I  drank  about  half 
of  it  first  chance  I  got  I  poured  the  rest  in  the  spittoon.  Every- 
body looked  at  me  when  I  come  in  the  door  and  begin  to  move 
around.  I  stopped  at  the  end  of  the  bar  close  to  the  door.  The 
bartender  said  to  me  do  you  want  another  drink.  No  I  said. 
Some  was  gambling.  One  sidled  up  close  to  me  and  said  to  me 
I  will  by  you  a  drink.  I  said  no  thank  you,  I  have  the  stomach 
trouble.  He  said  it  will  help  you.  I  said  maybe.  I  found  out 
later  he  was  the  guy  that  run  the  roullette  wheel.  I  give  him 
a  go  to  hell  look.  He  didn't  look  bad,  although  he  had  his  gun 
on.  I  did  too.  The  bar  tender  was  a  Mexican.  He  come  over 
to  me.  Said  to  me  the  law  don't  like  for  strangers  to  wear 
guns  in  town.  I  said  they  don't.  I  said  to  myself  the  rest  got 
theirs  on.  I  will  let  the  law  tell  me,  but  he  didn't. 

I  stayed  around  there  several  days.  I  was  in  that  place 
several  times  and  go  back  and  dance  with  the  girls  about  half 
of  girls  was  Mexican  girls.  Some  good  looking.  The  landlady 
the  girls  call  her  Aunt  Kate  she  was  from  Clovis.  Two  or 
three  them  Mexican  pimps  tried  to  frame  me  but  I  beat  them 
to  the  draw.  I  had  seen  several  of  them  kind.  By  this  time 
spring  was  here  and  the  grass  was  getting  green. 

One  morning  I  saddled  up  and  packed  my  pony  and  rode 
out  of  Fort  Sumner.  About  half  way  between  Fort  Sumner 
and  Melrose  I  stayed  all  night  in  a  cow  camp.  Was  lots  of 
sheep  in  that  country.  The  cow  men  didn't  like  the  sheep  men 
them  days.  At  the  camp  was  one  cowboy  there.  That  cowboy 
told  me  if  I  want  to  work  for  Mr.  Stocks  are  going  to  start 
to  work  in  a  day  or  two.  You  hang  around  here  tomorrow  if 
you  want  to.  No,  I  believe  I  will  pull  out. 

The  ranch  was  in  the  direction  I  wanted  to  go.  Was  a  hard 
days  ride.  About  sundown  I  rode  up.  One  of  the  cowpunchers 
said  get  down.  It  was  the  foreman.  But  I  didn't  know  at  the 
time  so  I  crawled  off.  He  come  out  and  went  with  me  to  put 
my  ponies  in  the  corral  and  feed  them.  So  we  went  back  to 


WEST  OF  THE  PECOS  171 

the  bunk  shack.  The  chuck  wagon  was  sitting  out  there  with 
the  sheet  and  bows  on  it  and  the  chuck  box  was  in  the  back. 
Was  five  or  six  cowboys  at  the  bunk  shack.  Wasn't  long  the 
cook  said  come  and  get  it.  This  guy  said  us  go  and  eat.  That 
sounded  good  to  me.  After  we  eat  this  same  man  went  with 
me  and  got  my  bedroll  and  put  it  in  the  bunk  shack.  Some 
played  cards.  I  set  in  and  listened  at  the  bull.  One  or  two 
wasn't  very  friendly.  They  was  pretty  boys  they  thought. 
They  was  from  Texas.  They  hadn't  been  in  New  Mexico  very 
long.  Hadn't  been  in  a  New  Mexico  town. 

The  foreman  asked  me  if  I  wanted  to  work  for  the  Jingle- 
bob  out  fit.  I  will  help  you  this  cow  work.  The  chuck  wagon 
pulled  away  from  the  Jinglebob  headquarters  on  my  birth- 
day. We  had  a  wild  west  show  for  several  days  after  the 
wagon  left  the  Jinglebob  headquarters.  We  pulled  out  down 
the  Pecos  about  fifty  miles  and  worked  back  up  the  Pecos. 
The  wagon  was  on  the  work  sixty  days  marking  and  branding 
and  held  the  steers  and  some  fat  cows.  The  chuck  wagon 
pulled  into  the  headquarters  for  a  day  or  so  and  then  started 
on  the  trail  to  Des  Moines.  We  didn't  have  much  trouble  get- 
ting there. 

We  turned  the  cattle  over  to  the  men  from  K.  C.  The  sec- 
ond day  we  headed  back  to  the  Jinglebob  Ranch.  Pulled  into 
the  headquarters.  The  foreman  paid  some  of  the  cowpunchers 
off  and  the  two  Texas  cowboys  went  back  to  Texas.  They 
didn't  like  New  Mexico.  One  trip  on  the  trail  was  enough  for 
them.  They  said  this  country  was  too  wild  for  them.  I  stayed 
two  years  on  the  Jinglebob  ranch.  At  times  it  was  rough  on 
the  Pecos. 

I  had  been  on  the  Jinglebob  about  twenty  months.  Had 
been  to  town  one  time.  Two  cowboys  and  myself  asked  the 
foreman  about  us  going  to  town  and  staying  a  few  days.  He 
said  we  could.  We  well  start  the  wagon  in  about  two  weeks. 
So  us  boys  went  in  to  Fort  Sumner.  We  was  there  about  a 
week.  Them  two  boys  was  bad  to  get  drunk.  I  hadn't  never 
been  in  town  with  them  before.  That  was  a  bad  town  to  get 
drunk  in.  I  told  them  boys  they  better  settle  down  when  they 
was  in  the  dance  hall  around  them  thugs  and  pimps.  One 
night  in  there  one  of  the  boys  got  into  it  with  a  pimp.  He  was 


172  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

a  Mexican.  He  came  after  this  boy  with  a  knife.  I  knocked 
him  down.  We  fought  our  way  out  the  door.  Two  got  bad 
wounded  so  that  bunch  was  on  our  trail.  So  we  rode  out  of 
town.  Went  back  to  the  ranch.  And  we  started  the  cow  work 
when  we  finished  the  cow  work  I  told  the  foreman  I  believe 
I  would  quit  a  while.  He  paid  me  and  said  when  you  want  to 
work  you  have  a  job. 

I  saddled  up  and  packed  my  pony  and  rode  off.  I  went  into 
Clovis  and  stayed  around  there  about  a  month.  That  wasn't 
a  Sunday  School  town.  I  was  in  a  hotel  and  run  into  Slaughter 
the  one  brand  V.  S.  and  he  told  me  he  needed  some  cowboys. 
He  was  going  to  start  the  wagon  in  a  few  days.  I  said  to 
Slaughter.  I  will  go  and  help  you  a  while.  Slaughter  said  my 
chuck  wagon  will  be  in  town  in  a  few  days  and  you  can  go 
back  with  him.  While  I'm  waiting  here  to  go  to  the  ranch  I 
heard  lots  of  talk  about  the  V.  S.  Some  good  some  bad.  The 
foreman  no  good.  That  didn't  worry  me  for  I  had  seen  several 
them  kind.  The  chuck  wagon  come  in.  I  helped  the  freighter 
load  up  the  wagon  and  we  left  for  the  ranch  on  the  way  I 
got  the  history  of  the  V.  S.  He  done  the  talking  and  I  done 
the  listening.  He  didn't  find  out  anything  from  we.  I  never 
told  him  my  name.  Was  leading  my  pony  behind  the  wagon 
and  I  was  ridin  on  the  wagon  beside  him  on  the  spring  seat. 

We  had  seen  wild  things.  I  said  I  am  going  to  kill  the  next 
thing  jumps  up.  We  hadn't  gone  far  a  coyote  jumped  up  I 
pulled  my  gun  and  killed  the  wolf.  He  never  said  anything. 
Looked  at  me.  We  arrived  at  the  ranch  late  in  the  evening. 
Was  several  cowboys  there.  They  unhooked  the  mules  from 
the  wagon.  I  went  and  untied  my  ponies  from  the  wagon  and 
taken  my  bedroll  off  and  went  with  the  freighter  to  the  cor- 
ral. I  unsaddled  and  put  my  ponies  in  the  corral.  He  and  I 
went  to  the  bunk  shack. 

Some  of  them  buttons  popped  off.  That  didn't  set  so  well 
with  me.  I  hadn't  been  used  to  slight  remarks.  I  liked  2  or  3 
of  them  cow  pokes.  I  like  some.  I  [they]  didn't  like  me  for  I 
didn't  take  a  hand  in  playing  poker  with  them.  I  was  a  new 
man.  I  didn't  like  the  foreman.  He  turned  out  just  like  that 
man  told  me.  It  was  several  days  before  Mr.  Slaughter  come 
out. 


WEST  OF  THE  PECOS  173 

One  night  that  same  bunch  was  playing  poker.  I  was  out 
of  the  bunk  house.  I  overheard  them  discussing  me.  One  said 
he  is  a  tenderfoot.  I  stepped  inside  with  my  gun  in  my  hand 
and  shot  through  the  roof.  I  said  settle  down  nobody  won't 
get  hurt.  I  said  now  you  city  cowboys,  I  don't  want  any  more 
slight  remarks  out  of  you  all.  About  that  time  that  smart 
foreman  come  stepping  high  down.  He  said  what  going  on 
down  here?  I  said  let  your  city  cow  boys  tell  you.  I  pulled 
my  bedroll  out  the  door  and  laid  down.  Kept  one  eye  open. 

The  next  day  the  foreman  said  to  me  I  don't  believe  you 
and  the  boys  can  get  along.  I  told  him  I  was  going  to  stay 
here  until  Slaughter  get  here.  In  a  few  days  Mr.  Slaughter 
come  in.  I  told  him  I  don't  think  I  will  work  for  you.  I  can't 
get  along  with  some  of  your  cow  boys.  He  asked  what  the 
trouble.  I  said  we  will  let  your  foremen  and  the  boys  tell  you. 
He  had  the  boss  and  all  us  cowboys  come  to  the  bunkhouse. 
He  asked  his  boss  what  was  the  trouble  the  other  night.  I  said 
to  all  of  them  youall  tell  it  just  like  it  was  and  tell  it  straight. 
Told  Mr.  Slaughter  I  won't  stay  here  and  work  might  be 
trouble.  I  cross  on  the  East  side  of  the  Pecos  then. 

I  went  on  the  west  of  the  Pecos  in  1902  and  come  back  on 
the  east  side  in  1918.  I  spent  16  years  in  New  Mexico  and 
Arizona  West  of  the  Pecos.  It  wasn't  long  after  I  came  back 
on  the  east  side  of  the  Pecos  I  married  a  New  Mexico  girl.  It 
was  rough  on  a  woman  to  keep  her  on  the  cow  ranches  them 
days.  We  toughed  it  out  until  our  first  baby  was  born.  Her 
health  wasn't  so  good  after  that  so  I  never  did  carry  her  back 
to  live  on  a  ranch  any  more.  I  kept  working  on  for  about  a 
year.  So  in  1923  I  gave  up  the  wild  country  west  of  the  Pecos 
and  the  wild  cows.  Many  times  I  look  back  over  my  life  and 
west  of  the  Pecos. 

The  End 

Jal,  N.  M. 
Feb.  4, 1960 
Dear  Mr.  Reeve : 

I  am  droping  you  a  few  lines.  How  are  you  well  I  hope.  Well  Mr. 
Reeve  wife  and  I  made  all  ok  from  up  there  but  the  snow  and  ice  sure 
was  ruff  going  I  shure  haid  the  work  to  get  everthing  in  shape  for  the 
Boss,  he  con  in  a  few  days  ago  I  am  at  home  know.  Reservation  I  got 


174  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

to  thinking  I  got  my  knotes  down  and  look  them  over  I  am  sinding 

you  the  name  of  them  Indian. 

*       *       * 

Dear  Mr  Reeve 

I  look  thew  my  notes  I  am  sinding  them  to  you  my  Love  still  stand  out 

for  the  mexican  papeal,  and  the  Indian  Papeal  for  they  was  a  true 

friend  of  mine  I  haid  Indian  girls  friend  and  mexican  girls  friend 

mexican  girl  save  my  life  on  time,  if  I  could  see  you  I  could  tell  you 

lots  about  the  Indian  and  the  mexican  papeal  them  days,  they  was  a 

true  blue  friend  of  mine  I  could  carry  a  huard  of  cattle  threw  they 

country  iny  time,  and  when  I  call  on  the  Spanish  papeal  to  help  me 

never  turn  me  dawn. 

I  hope  this  find  you  well  I  have  bin  puney  but  feel  better  I  will  close  as 

ever  your  friend  write  me  when  you  can 

E.  L.  Stephens 

Box  22 

JalNM 


Notes  and  Documents 

February  17, 1961 

Dr.  John  D.  Greenleaf 
Department  of  History 
Mexico  City  College 
Mexico,  D.  F. 

Dear  Dr.  Greenleaf: 

Having  read  your  review  of  Our  Spanish  Southwest  in  the  New 
Mexico  Historical  Review,  I  am  curious  to  learn  whether  an  attempted 
corrective  measure  has  missed  fire. 

The  printer  was  breaking  in  a  new  typesetter,  who  introduced  a 
new  error  in  about  one  out  of  every  three  lines  that  he  reset.  Therefore, 
I  requested  and  read  a  second  page  proof,  which  also  abounded  in 
"typos",  and  by  that  time  the  editor  and  I  were  growing  weary  so  that 
we  were  unable  to  detect  all  of  them.  After  the  printing,  the  editor  em- 
ployed a  good  proofreader,  and  she  and  I  made  a  list  of  the  "typos"  from 
which  the  publisher  printed  a  sheet  of  errata  with  assurance  that  it 
would  be  inserted  in  all  copies. 

Now  I  find  that  that  insert  is  not  appearing  in  books  received 
locally,  and  I  am  making  inquiry  as  to  whether  it  went  out  in  review 
copies.  I  judge  from  your  review  that  it  did  not,  and  if  not,  you  really 
let  me  off  kindly ! 

This  is  not  an  attempt  to  excuse  a  half  dozen  factual  errors,  which 
I  made  myself.  They  will  be  corrected  in  the  next  printing. 

Sincerely  yours, 
Lynn  I.  Perrigo 
Head,  Department  of 
History  and  Social  Science 
as 

P.  S.  However,  I  do  take  issue  with  one  of  your  criticisms.  Chapters  I, 
XIII,  and  XIX,  dealing  with  the  Indians  are  not  restricted  to  the 
Navajo.  And  it  is  interesting  how  opinions  differ.  Another  critic  thought 
that  there  was  too  much  on  the  early  period — that  it  would  be  difficult 
for  a  reader  to  plod  through  all  those  strange  names  and  remote  events ! 

L.  P. 


175 


Book  Review 

Apache,  Navaho,  and  Spaniard.  By  Jack  D.  Forbes.  Norman, 
1960.  University  of  Oklahoma  Press.  Illustrations.  Maps. 
Bibliography.  Index.  Pp.  xxvi,  303.  $5.95. 

From  the  coming  of  Spanish  colonists  to  New  Mexico 
under  Juan  de  Ofiate  at  the  close  of  the  16th  century  until  the 
arrival  of  the  Comanches  in  the  early  18th  century,  the 
Apaches  and  Navahos  provided  the  chief  threat  to  Spanish 
occupation.  In  1680  the  Pueblo  Indians  rebelled  and,  aided  by 
these  wild  nomads,  drove  the  Spaniards  from  New  Mexico. 
The  survivors  founded  a  new  town,  El  Paso,  at  the  ford  of  the 
Rio  Grande.  It  required  nearly  twenty  years  for  the  Spaniards 
to  restore  their  hegemony  over  the  rebellious  Pueblo  tribes. 

Apache,  Navaho,  and  Spaniard  covers  this  period,  from 
the  coming  of  the  Spaniards  to  their  return  to  the  Rio  Grande 
valley  after  the  Pueblo  Revolt.  In  his  Introduction  Professor 
Forbes  sketches  the  background  of  the  southern  Athapascans, 
who  had  wandered  far  from  the  main  body  of  their  linguistic 
family  in  northwestern  Canada  and  Alaska. 

Missionary  eorts  to  convert  the  Apaches  and  Navahos, 
although  they  occasionally  appeared  promising  or  fruitful,  in 
the  long  run  made  no  impression.  One  of  the  most  significant 
results  of  the  Spanish-Indian  relationship  in  New  Mexico 
was  the  diffusion  of  the  Spanish  horse  among  enemy  tribes 
and  in  a  wild  state.  The  Spanish  policy  of  capturing  Apaches 
and  Navahos  for  sale  as  slaves  in  Chihuahua  intensified  the 
conflict,  and  precluded  the  possibility  of  more  than  temporary 
periods  of  peace. 

Most  of  the  previously-published  accounts  of  the  Apaches 
and  Navahos  in  the  early  Spanish  period  have  been  articles 
or  have  had  merely  a  secondary  interest  in  these  Indians. 
Professor  Forbes  has  told  their  story  in  detail,  basing  his 
study  on  archival  documents  as  well  as  selected  secondary 
sources. 

University  of  Florida  DONALD  E.  WORCESTER 

176 


•V 


^Mexico 


Historical  "Review 


Palace  of  the  Governors,  Santa  Fe 


July,  1961 


Editors 
FRANK  D.  REEVE  PAUL  A.  F.  WALTER 

Associates 

PERCY  M.  BALDWIN  GEORGE  P.  HAMMOND 

FRANCE  V.  SCHOLES  ELEANOR  B.  ADAMS 

BRUCE  T.ELLIS 

VOL.  XXXVI  JULY,  1961  No.  3 


CONTENTS 

Page 

Edmund  G.  Ross  as  Governor  of  New  Mexico  Territory: 
a  Reappraisal 

Howard  R.  Lamar 179 

The  Presidio  Supply  Problem  of  New  Mexico  in  the 
Eighteenth  Century 

Max  L.  Moorhead 210 

Frank  Bond :  Gentleman  Sheepherder  of  Northern  New  Mexico, 
1883-1915  (continued) 

Frank  H.  Grubbs 230 

Book  Reviews  244 


THE  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW  is  published  jointly  by  the 
Historical  Society  of  New  Mexico  and  the  University  of  New  Mexico. 
Subscription  to  the  REVIEW  is  by  membership  in  the  Society — open  to  all. 
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bers, except  a  few  which  have  become  scarce,  are  $1.00  each.  For  further 
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Membership  dues  and  other  business  communications  should  be  ad- 
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to  Prof.  Frank  D.  Reeve,  University  of  New  Mexico,  Albuquerque,  N.  M. 

Entered  as  second-class  matter  at  Santa  Fe,  New  Mexico 
PRINTED  AT  THE  UNIVERSITY  OP  NEW  MEXICO,  ALBUQUERQUE 


VOL.  XXXVI  JULY,  1961  No.  3 

EDMUND  G.  ROSS  AS  GOVERNOR  OF 

NEW  MEXICO  TERRITORY 

A  REAPPRAISAL 

By  HOWARD  R.  LAMAR 

ONE  evening  in  the  early  spring  of  1889,  Edmund  G.  Ross 
invited  the  Territorial  Secretary  of  New  Mexico,  George 
W.  Lane,  in  for  a  smoke  by  a  warm  fire.  As  they  sat  in  the 
family  living  quarters  of  the  Palace  of  the  Governors  and 
talked  over  the  day's  events,  it  became  obvious  that  the  Gov- 
ernor was  troubled  about  something.  Unable  to  keep  still  he 
left  his  chair  and  paced  the  floor  in  silence.  Finally  he  re- 
marked :  "I  had  hoped  to  induct  New  Mexico  into  Statehood."1 
In  those  few  words  Ross  summed  up  all  the  frustrations  he 
had  experienced  in  his  four  tempestuous  years  as  the  chief 
executive  of  New  Mexico  Territory. 

So  briefly,  or  hostilely,  has  his  career  as  governor  been  re- 
ported— both  in  the  press  of  his  own  time  and  in  the  standard 
histories  of  New  Mexico — and  so  little  legislation  is  associated 
with  his  name,  that  one  learns  with  genuine  surprise  that  he 
had  been  even  an  advocate  of  statehood.  Marion  Dargan,  in 
his  study  of  the  New  Mexican  statehood  struggles,  remarks 
that  L.  Bradford  Prince  was  the  only  governor  between  1851 
and  1890  to  work  for  admission  into  the  Union.2  It  is  ironic, 

1.  Lillian  Ross  Leis,  "Memoirs  of  Edmund  G.  Ross."  Typescript  in  the  Edmund 
Gibson  Ross  Papers  in  the  Archives  Division  of  the  New  Mexico  State  Records  Center 
(Santa  Fe).  The  author  is  grateful  to  Dr.  Myra  Ellen  Jenkins,  Chief  Archivist,  for  per- 
mission to  use  the  Ross  Papers  and  for  many  valuable  suggestions  concerning:  the  writing 
of  this  article. 

177 


178  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

indeed,  that  Ross,  who  was  by  career  a  newspaper  editor  and 
a  devoted  believer  in  the  press  as  an  instrument  of  truth, 
should  have  been  so  consistently  its  victim  throughout  his 
own  public  career. 

Edmund  G.  Ross  owes  his  place  in  American  history — and 
a  very  respectable  place  it  is — to  his  dramatic  and  stubborn 
refusal  as  a  Kansas  Senator  to  vote  for  Andrew  Johnson's 
impeachment  in  1868.  After  that  painful  moment  he  was  a 
ruined  man  politically,  excoriated  by  the  national  Republican 
press  as  a  traitor  to  his  party  and  accused  of  corruption  and 
bribery.  He  was  denounced  even  more  by  his  constituents 
back  in  Kansas,  for  they  had  directed  him  by  letter  and  me- 
morial to  vote  with  the  Radicals  against  Johnson.3 

This  bitter  experience  forced  Ross  to  return  to  the  Demo- 
cratic party,  which  he  had  left  as  early  as  1844  in  order  to 
satisfy  his  strong  anti-slavery  convictions.  Belonging  to  the 
minority  party  in  Republican  Kansas,  it  was  impossible  for 
him  to  emerge  from  the  political  shadows  again  until  the 
Democrats  returned  to  national  power  with  Grover  Cleve- 
land's victory  in  1884.  The  news  that  Cleveland  had  appointed 
Ross  governor  of  New  Mexico  Territory  aroused  much  of  the 
old  newspaper  bitterness;  and  some  of  the  senators,  with 
Ross'  defection  still  vivid  in  their  memories,  were  so  deter- 
mined to  defeat  his  nomination  that  the  Kansan  had  been  de 
facto  governor  for  a  year  before  the  Senate  confirmed  his 
appointment.4 

If  Ross  was  the  target  of  unfair  national  criticism  and 
calumny  in  1868,  he  was  equally  the  victim  of  a  legend  which 
had  grown  up  around  him  in  the  succeeding  eighteen  years. 
Gradually  realizing  that  his  vote  for  Johnson  had  not  been 
the  result  of  a  corrupt  bargain,  the  public  had  come  instead 

2.  Marion   Daman,   "New  Mexico's   Figrht  for  Statehood.   1895-1912,"  New  Mexico 
Historical  Review,  XIV  (January,  1939),  p.  6. 

3.  This  portion  of  Ross'  career  has  been  sympathetically  covered  in  some  detail  in 
Senator  John  F.  Kennedy's  Profiles  in  Courage  (N.Y.,  1956)  ;  see  also  "Edmund  Gibson 
Ross"   in   the  Dictionary  of  American  Biography,   XVI,   pp.   175-176.    For   Ross'   own 
account  of  the  trial  see  his  History  of  the  Impeachment  of  Andrew  Johnson,  President 
of  the  United  States  by  the  House  of  Representatives  and  his  Trial  by  the  Senate  for 
High  Crimes  and  Misdemeanors  in  Office,  1868  (Santa  Fe,  1896). 

4.  Ross  was  appointed  May  27,  1885,  and  received  Senate  confirmation  on  April  29, 
1886.  Earl  S.  Pomeroy,  The  Territories  and  the  United  States,  1861-1890   (Philadelphia, 
1947),  p.  110. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  179 

to  regard  Ross  as  an  honorable  man  but  so  stubborn,  opinion- 
ated, and  idealistic,  that  he  was  difficult  to  work  with.  They 
had  also  come  to  regard  him  as  a  reformer.  And  to  complete 
the  stereotype — although  he  was  only  fifty-nine  years  old 
when  he  became  governor  of  New  Mexico — the  newspapers 
persistently  pictured  him  as  an  elderly  man  in  broken  health, 
bowed  by  time  and  misfortune,  more  cantankerous  and  bitter 
than  wise.  The  Denver  Opinion's  description  of  him  is  fairly 
typical  of  most  papers:  "an  aged  and  obscure  man  with  a 
sallow,  hungry  countenance  and  thin  faded  hair."  The  Star 
and  Kansan  called  him,  "that  physically  puny  man."5 

These  were  the  basic  elements  of  a  newspaper  portrait  of 
Ross  which  was  to  be  peddled  daily  during  his  governorship 
(1885-1889)  by  the  local  press,  and  particularly  by  Ross' 
political  enemy,  Colonel  Max  Frost,  the  strongminded,  arro- 
gant editor  of  the  Santa  Fe  New  Mexican.  By  far  the  most 
powerful  newspaper  in  the  Territory,  the  New  Mexican  was 
also  the  official  spokesman  for  the  local  Republican  party  and 
for  the  so-called  "Santa  Fe  Ring."  At  that  time  the  paper  was 
partly  owned  by  ex-Senator  Stephen  W.  Dorsey,  of  "Star 
Route"  Mail  frauds  notoriety.  Dorsey  was  now  engaged  in 
open-range  ranching  and  was  a  business  associate  of  the 
Maxwell  Land  Grant  Company,  so  that  the  New  Mexican 
naturally  defended  both  these  interests.  Frost  was  also  a 
politician  of  no  mean  ability.  He  had  served  as  United  States 
Land  Register,  Adjutant  General  of  the  Territorial  Militia, 
member  of  the  Board  of  Immigration,  and  as  secretary  to  the 
New  Mexico  Territorial  Cattleman's  Association.  A  good 
arranger  and  campaign  manager,  he  was  secretary  of  the 
Republican  Central  Committee  for  a  quarter  of  a  century.6 

To  Governor  Ross  and  the  reform  element  in  the  Cleveland 
administration,  Frost  and  the  New  Mexican  were  symbols  of 
nearly  every  evil  they  hoped  to  erase  from  New  Mexico.  Frost, 
in  turn,  saw  Ross  as  such  a  threat  that  he  seized  upon  Ross' 
reputation  as  a  stubborn,  cranky  reformer,  and  so  implanted 
this  caricature  in  the  minds  of  his  readers,  that  it  persisted 

5.  Denver  Opinion,  July  18,  1885  ;  The  Star  and  Kansan,  January  16,  1885.  Clip- 
pings in  the  Ross  Papers. 

6.  Ralph  E.  Twitchell,  Leading  Facts  of  New  Mexican  History  ( Cedar  Rapids,  Iowa, 
1912),  II,  497-498  ;  also  the  Las  Vegas  Chronicle,  Oct.  25,  1886. 


180  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

throughout  the  Governor's  lifetime  and  has  been  perpetuated 
by  such  New  Mexico  historians  as  Twitchell  and  Prince. 

If  one  might  cite  an  example  of  the  caricature :  perhaps 
Frost's  most  brilliant  reportorial  stroke  was  his  interpreta- 
tion of  Ross'  inauguration.  When  the  new  governor  and  his 
family  came  to  Santa  Fe  on  the  evening  of  May  26,  1885,  he 
announced  to  his  predecessor,  Lionel  A.  Sheldon,  that  he 
wished  to  avoid  the  parties  and  fanfare  which  usually  sur- 
rounded the  inaugural  ceremony.  While  this  plan  fitted  with 
Ross'  own  natural  modesty,  it  also  allowed  his  wife — a  firm 
temperance  advocate — to  escape  the  embarrassment  of  hold- 
ing a  teetotaling  reception  in  convivial  Santa  Fe.  Various 
members  of  Ross'  party  suggested  that  since  he  was  being 
hailed  as  a  reformer,  he  should  take  office  at  dawn,  for  it  was  a 
New  Mexican  Indian  legend  that  some  day  Montezuma  would 
return  at  that  hour  to  deliver  them  from  bondage.  Governor 
Sheldon  acquiesced;  and  on  June  15,  just  as  the  sun  broke 
over  the  blue  Sangre  de  Cristo  range,  the  simple  oath-taking 
ceremony  occurred  at  the  Palace.  Mrs.  Sheldon  thought  this 
was  all  very  clever,  and  in  a  gay  mood  broke  out  a  new  hat 
for  the  occasion.7  Somehow  the  news  of  the  ceremony  reached 
nearby  Fort  Marcy,  where  the  officers  fired  off  an  early  morn- 
ing salute  to  honor  Ross.  The  thunder  of  cannon  sent  the 
sleeping  inhabitants  tumbling  out  of  doors  to  see  what  could 
be  the  matter. 

Frost,  in  reporting  this  event,  christened  the  Governor 
"Montezuma"  Ross ;  and  from  that  day  on  the  nickname  "Old 
Monte"  stuck.  In  subsequent  months  he  was  to  picture  Ross 
as  a  pompous  avenging  angel  bringing  the  unneeded  torch  of 
reform  to  New  Mexico.  And  on  each  occasion  he  humorously 
and  brilliantly  twisted  Ross'  identification  with  Montezuma 
into  a  symbol  of  "rule  or  ruin"  aggression.8 

A  second  image  soon  to  be  portrayed  by  Frost  and  the  New 
Mexican  and  many  other  papers  as  well,  was  that  of  Ross  as 
a  Kansas  "interloper,"  a  sort  of  latter-day  John  Brown  who 
could  not  possibly  understand  the  internal  needs  and  unique 

7.  L.   Bradford  Prince,  A  Concise  History  of  New  Mexico    (Cedar  Rapids,   Iowa, 
1912),  pp.  205-206 ;  Twitchell,  p.  496  ff. ;  Leis,  "Memoirs  of  Ross." 

8.  Santa  Fe  New  Mexican,  June  15,  1885. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  181 

Spanish-American  character  of  New  Mexico.  Thus  Ross  was 
cast  in  the  perennially  unpopular  role  of  "non-resident  fed- 
eral appointee"  of  the  genus  "carpetbagger."9  The  effect  of 
this  image  is  seen  when  some  two  years  later  the  citizens  of  a 
section  of  Grant  County,  furious  with  Ross  for  refusing  to 
create  a  new  county  for  them,  burned  him  in  effigy  and  de- 
nounced "Monte  Ross  and  his  rascally  set  of  Kansas  plunder- 
ers." Towards  the  end  of  his  term  The  Black  Range  cried  that 
the  Territory  had  had  enough  of  "Jay  Hawker  Ross"  and 
carpetbagger  Democrats.10 

However,  Ross  did  not  spring  from  the  gloom  of  retire- 
ment in  Kansas  to  the  limelight  of  political  prominence  by 
way  of  an  overnight  trip  on  the  Atchison,  Topeka,  and  Santa 
Fe.  He  had  actually  come  to  New  Mexico  in  1882,  some  three 
years  before  he  became  governor.11  His  decision  to  move  was 
undoubtedly  prompted  by  his  having  suffered  a  decisive  defeat 
as  a  candidate  for  the  governorship  of  Kansas  in  1880. 

He  deliberately  chose  to  settle  in  the  booming  town  of 
Albuquerque,  for  with  the  completion  of  the  Santa  Fe  line 
to  that  point,  it  had  become  an  important  business,  freighting, 
and  outfitting  center  for  the  mining  camps  in  the  Cerrillos 
and  Black  Range  districts  as  well  as  for  the  Army  posts  and 
Indian  reservations  to  the  south  and  west.  Although  Ross 
ostensibly  came  to  Albuquerque  as  a  newspaper  man,  working 
for  the  Albuquerque  Morning  Journal,  he  had  seen  enough  of 
the  Kansas  frontier  to  know  that  here  was  a  chance  to  make 
a  modest  fortune  by  "growing  up"  with  a  still  newer  West. 
Full  of  hope  for  the  future,  he  wrote  his  wife  in  February, 
1883,  that  he  was  in  on  a  big  mining  venture  which  looked  so 
good  that  he  had  quit  the  newspaper  and  was  busily  studying 
Spanish  deeds  and  grants  to  the  property.12 

Nor  did  Ross  pick  Albuquerque  out  of  thin  air.  He  was  in 
correspondence  with  his  brother-in-law,  H.C.  Bennett,  who 
had  settled  in  Silver  City  and  undoubtedly  praised  the  mining 
future  of  the  region.13  Two  of  Ross'  former  Kansas  friends 

9.  Ibid.,  June  1  to  September  1,  1886 ;  January  1  to  March  30,  1887,  passim. 

10.  Deming  Headlight,  March  4,  1887 ;  The  Black  Range,  January  28,  1889. 

11.  Twitchell,  II,  496-497n. 

12.  E.  G.  Ross  to  Fanny  Lathrop  Ross,  Albuquerque,  February  6,  1883.  Ross  Papers. 

13.  Leis,  "Memoirs  of  Ross"  ;  National  Cyclopaedia  of  Biography,  XXV,  65-66. 


182  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

had  settled  in  Albuquerque.  Elias  Sleeper  Stover,  and  ex-lieu- 
tenant governor  of  Kansas,  had  moved  to  Albuquerque  some 
years  before  and  had  founded  the  large  wholesale  grocery 
concern,  Stover,  Crary,  and  Company.14  A  former  Free- 
Soiler,  and  a  Civil  War  veteran  of  fifty-one  engagements, 
Stover  was  destined  by  nature  and  background  to  become 
Ross'  friend.  It  is  not  surprising  to  find  that  the  two  men  soon 
were  closely  allied  in  ambitious  projects  to  advance  their  own 
and  Albuquerque's  future.  Having  arrived  in  the  "Duke  City" 
before  the  Atchison,  Topeka  and  Santa  Fe,  Stover,  in  associa- 
tion with  Franz  Huning  and  William  C.  Hazeldine,  had 
bought  up  the  land  between  the  Barelas  Road  and  the  pro- 
posed depot  and  laid  out  the  "new  town."  In  this  way  they 
capitalized  quite  handsomely  on  the  coming  of  the  railroad. 
Stover  was  also  one  of  the  founders  of  the  First  National 
Bank  of  Albuquerque.  As  a  man  with  money  to  invest,  he  was 
naturally  interested  in  projects  to  build  local  spur  lines  and 
in  mining  ventures.  Upon  Ross*  arrival  he  invited  him  to 
participate  in  several  of  his  schemes.15 

Ross'  other  Kansas  acquaintance  was  W.  S.  Burke,  editor 
of  the  Albuquerque  Morning  Journal.  A  Civil  War  veteran, 
he  had  worked  on  papers  in  Iowa  and  Kansas  before  coming 
to  Albuquerque  in  1881.16  Although  the  Journal  was  Republi- 
can in  tone,  Burke  asked  Ross  to  join  his  staff  and  the  latter 
appears  to  have  done  much  editorial  writing  for  it.  Soon,  he 
and  Burke  were  as  much  of  a  team  as  Ross  and  Stover  were. 
When  the  Albuquerque,  Copper  City,  and  Colorado  Railroad 
Company  was  organized  in  1883,  Burke  and  Ross  appeared  as 
two  of  the  directors.17 

Ross  was  of  immediate  use  to  the  business  and  railroad 
men  of  Albuquerque  both  as  a  publicist  of  ability  and  as  a 
former  United  States  Senator.  In  the  latter  capacity  he  had 

14.  Bernice  Ann  Rebord,  A  Social  History  of  Albuquerque,  1880-1885.  Unpublished 
Master's  Thesis   (Department  of  History,  University  of  New  Mexico,  1947),  p.  11. 

15.  Victor    Westphall,    History    of   Albuquerque,    1870-1880.    Unpublished    Master's 
Thesis   (Department  of  History,  University  of  New  Mexico,  1947),  p.  87;  also  papers 
and  documents  entitled  "Railroads"  in  the  Ross  Papers ;  Twitchell,  V,  265. 

16.  Archie  M.  McDowell,  The  Opposition  to  Statehood  Within  the  Territory  of  New 
Mexico,  1888-1903.  Unpublished  Master's  Thesis   (Department  of  History,  University  of 
New  Mexico,  1939),  p.  27. 

17.  Rebord,  Social  History  of  Albuquerque,  pp.  i-vi. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  183 

access  to  key  men  in  Washington  and  could  come  and  go  on 
the  floor  of  the  Senate.  Nearly  a  year  before  the  Democrats 
came  into  power,  Ross  went  to  Washington  where  he  pressed 
for  a  grant  of  land  for  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  Railroad 
(which  line  had  now  been  absorbed  by  the  Santa  Fe) .  At  the 
same  time,  he  and  various  other  Albuquerque  business  men 
had  planned  to  build  a  veritable  spiderweb  of  narrow  gauge 
railroads  to  connect  Albuquerque  with  the  new  mining 
camps.18  The  Morning  Journal  began  to  praise  the  narrow 
gauge  scheme,  and  Ross  himself  was  listed  as  the  vice  presi- 
dent and  financial  agent  of  the  narrow  gauge  companies.  At 
one  time  the  companies  had  no  less  than  five  railroads  under 
consideration.19 

It  would  be  misleading  to  attribute  too  many  Beardian 
economic  impulses  to  Ross  and  his  associates.  While  they  were 
determined  to  help  forge  New  Mexico's  railroad  future,  they 
were  equally  determined  to  change  New  Mexico's  cultural 
history.  Burke,  Stover,  and  Ross  were  concerned  that  after 
nearly  forty  years  of  American  rule  the  Territory  still  had 
no  public  school  system.  They  were  appalled  that  much  of 
the  population  still  spoke  only  Spanish.  Burke  lamented  that 
not  one  in  ten  justices  of  the  peace  had  a  territorial  code  of 
laws  in  his  office,  or  that  if  he  did,  he  did  not  know  how  to 
read  them.20  Revealing  their  abolitionist  backgrounds  they 
saw  the  public  school  and  education  as  the  essential  instru- 
ment necessary  to  "Americanize"  and  "democratize"  New 
Mexico.21 

Some  two  years  before  he  became  governor,  Ross  in  co- 
operation with  Burke,  wrote  a  bill  "for  the  establishment  of 
a  public  school  system  in  the  Territories,"  which  they  sent  to 
Senator  George  F.  Edmunds.  At  the  time  Edmunds  was  bus- 
ily pushing  anti-Mormon  legislation  through  Congress.  Hop- 
ing to  enlist  his  interest  in  New  Mexico's  plight,  Burke  sug- 

18.  W.  S.  Burke  to  Ross,  January  3,  1884  ;  also  MS  letter  Burke?  to  Ross?,  January 
1,  1884  in  "Letters  Received,  1884"  in  Ross  Papers. 

19.  Albuquerque  Morning  Journal,  August    (n.d.),  1883;  clipping  in  Ross  Papers. 
See  also  pamphlet  The  New  Mexico  System  of  Narrow  Gauge  Railroads  (N.Y.,  1883)  in 
Ross  Papers.  Rebord,  Social  History  of  Albuquerque,  p.  13. 

20.  Albuquerque  Morning  Journal,  July  23,  1883. 

21.  W.  S.  Burke  to  Ross,  January  8,  1884.  Ross  Papers. 


184  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

gested  that  the  Catholic  Church  played  the  same  role  in  resist- 
ing American  social  and  political  institutions  in  New  Mexico 
that  the  Mormon  Church  did  in  Utah.  "We  can  never  have 
public  schools  in  the  world,  in  this  priest-ridden  Territory, 
unless  Congress  takes  the  matter  in  hand,  and  now  while  the 
fight  against  Mormonism  is  going  on  is  the  very  time  to  move 
in  the  matter."22  In  a  covering  letter  to  Edmunds  he  declared 
with  real  abolitionist  fervor : 

The  enemy  to  progress  and  civilization  that  we  have  to  fight 
in  New  Mexico,  is  not  polygamy,  but  Romanism — and  between 
this  and  the  Utah  blight  there  is  but  little  room  to  choose.  You 
are,  of  course,  aware  of  the  miserable  educational  system — or 
more  properly,  absence  of  all  system — which  is  maintained  in 
this  Territory.  We  are  absolutely  without  any  system  of  public 
education  whatever  in  the  sense  in  which  the  term  is  used  in 
the  United  States.23 

Burke's  solution  was  to  take  education  "out  of  the  hands 
of  the  legislature  and  county  officers  altogether"  and  to  permit 
only  the  federal  officers  to  run  the  system.  Their  duties  in- 
cluded, incidentally,  the  power  to  levy  school  taxes. 

Burke's  bill  and  others  like  it  were  introduced  but  were 
never  passed.  It  is  useful  however,  as  a  mirror  of  Ross'  and 
Burke's  attitude  towards  New  Mexico,  and  it  suggests  that 
just  as  the  Radicals  had  tried  to  reconstruct  the  post-Civil 
War  South,  they  were  willing  to  use  federal  law  to  "recon- 
struct" New  Mexico.  When  his  bill  died  in  Committee,  Burke 
continued  the  educational  struggle  by  becoming  the  first 
Superintendent  of  Public  Instruction  of  Bernalillo  County.24 
Some  years  later,  Ross'  other  Kansas  friend,  Elias  Stover,  was 
to  become  the  first  President  of  the  University  of  New 
Mexico.25 

The  goals  of  the  newcomers  to  Albuquerque  did  not  stop 
with  matters  of  economic  and  cultural  progress.  Surrounding 

22.  W.  S.  Burke  to  George  F.  Edmunds,  December  21,  1883.  Ross  Papers. 
28.  Ibid. 

24.  Burke  was  aided  in  his  fight  for  local  schools  by  Ross'  having  persuaded  Congress 
to  donate  certain  public  lands  remaining  in  the  Albuquerque  town  grant  for  educational 
purposes.  See  MS  "Land  Grant  for  Town  of  Albuquerque"  in  Ross  Papers. 

25.  TwitcheU,  V,  177. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  185 

Ross  were  intelligent  and  ambitious  young  lawyers  and  mer- 
chants of  both  parties  who  were  chafing  under  the  rule  of  that 
peculiar  organization  called  the  Santa  Fe  Ring.  Whether  Re- 
publican or  Democrat  they  discovered  that  no  economic  or 
political  move  could  be  accomplished  without  first  consulting 
the  powers  at  Santa  Fe.  The  young  Albuquerqueans,  in  alli- 
ance with  leaders  from  southern  and  eastern  portions  of  the 
territory,  had  begun  to  rebel  as  early  as  1882.  In  1884  they 
had  sent  contesting  members  to  the  Assembly  of  1884,  and 
had  tried  unsuccessfully  to  get  the  capitol  removed  from  the 
City  of  the  Holy  Faith  to  Albuquerque.26  Embittered  by  the 
questionable  tactics  which  the  Santa  Feans  used  to  retain 
the  seat  of  government,  the  fight  broadened  into  a  war  be- 
tween ring  and  anti-ring  Republicans.  The  former  were  ably 
represented  by  Max  Frost,  William  Breeden,  L.  Bradford 
Prince,  and  Thomas  B.  Catron,  while  the  insurgents  were 
led  by  a  brace  of  colorful  colonels :  J.  Francisco  Chavez  and 
William  F.  Rynerson.27  The  battle  continued  into  the  fall  when 
the  Santa  Feans  nominated  Prince  as  their  candidate  for 
delegate  while  the  anti-ring  forces  chose  Rynerson  to  run  on 
an  independent  ticket.28 

Both  Burke  and  Ross  were  delighted  at  the  turn  of  politi- 
cal events.  To  one  it  offered  the  chance  of  a  reformed  Repub- 
lican party,  and  to  the  other  a  chance  for  the  Democrats  to 
win  the  delegateship  in  a  three  man  race.  The  Morning  Jour- 
•nal,  for  whom  it  must  be  remembered  Ross  worked,  began 
to  roast  the  Santa  Fe  ring  at  every  opportunity.  And  since 
frontier  editors  habitually  most  enjoyed  attacking  other  fron- 
tier editors,  Burke  and  Ross  never  failed  to  attack  Max  Frost 
as  the  chief  villain  of  that  organization.  In  the  spring  of 
1884,  the  Journal  reported  every  rebellious  act  of  the  Chavez- 
Rynerson  forces  with  the  thoroughness  of  a  New  York  Times 
but  the  partisanship  of  the  Daily  Worker.  The  tone  of  the 
articles  is  amply  illustrated  by  a  typical  aside  in  a  report  of  a 
meeting  of  the  Republican  Territorial  Convention : 

26.  Ibid.,  II,  493-494 ;  also  G.  P.  Hammond  and  T.  C.  Donnelly,  The  Story  of  New 
Mexico:  Its  History  and  Government  (Albuquerque,  1936),  p.  135. 

27.  Twitchell,  II,  493. 

28.  For  an  excellent  summary  of  the  Republican  split  in  1884,  see  The  Sante  Fe 
Weekly  New  Mexican,  September  1,  1884.  (Bancroft). 


186  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

The  most  intense  feeling  of  hatred  against  Max  Frost  has 
come  to  light.  It  does  not  seem  to  be  from  any  one  section,  but 
is  joined  in  by  both  North  and  South  counties.29 

Seeing  a  chance  to  bring  about  new  political  alignments, 
Ross  threw  himself  into  the  Democratic  delegate  and  national 
campaign  of  1884  with  real  vigor.  He  supported  the  local 
Democracy's  choice  for  delegate:  the  smiling,  urbane  Taos 
merchant  and  land  owner,  Antonio  Joseph.  He  was  also  glad 
to  see  Colonel  J.F.  Chavez  throw  his  support  to  Joseph  at 
the  last  moment  when  it  became  apparent  that  Rynerson  could 
not  win.30 

The  better  Ross  came  to  know  his  own  party  members  in 
New  Mexico,  however,  the  more  disturbed  he  became.  The 
chairman  of  the  Democratic  Party's  central  committee  in 
the  Territory,  C.  H.  Gildersleeve,  had  bought  that  position 
for  mercenary  reasons,  was  a  speculator  in  land  grants,  and 
was  closely  tied  to  the  Santa  Fe  ring  by  friendship  and  busi- 
ness connections.  It  was  apparent  that  he  would  never  declare 
for  reform.  Then  Ross  discovered  that  Antonio  Joseph  had 
crossed  party  lines  on  local  issues  so  often  that  he  was  actually 
a  political  chameleon.  Some  years  later  Ross  confided  his 
feelings  to  a  remarkably  frank  manuscript  in  which  he  called 
Gildersleeve  "the  main  Democratic  manipulator  for  the  Santa 
Fe  Ring  and  the  most  unscrupulous  of  all  that  combination." 
Joseph  was  described  in  this  document  as  "Gildersleeve's 
henchman"  who  had  actually  been  elected  to  Congress  by  a 
split  in  the  Republican  party  "engineered"  by  the  Ring.31 

In  Ross'  eyes  other  Democratic  leaders  of  superior  talents 
also  revealed  a  distressing  ambivalence  when  it  came  to  party 
loyalty.  The  extremely  capable  Judge  Henry  L.  Waldo  called 
himself  a  Democrat  but  was  actually  a  member  of  the  original 
Santa  Fe  ring  and  a  law  partner  of  the  chairman  of  the  terri- 
torial Republican  Party.32  Another  Democrat  whose  ability 
Ross  wanted  to  use  was  William  T.  Thornton.  But  the  embar- 

29.  Albuquerque  Morning  Journal,  May  4,  1884. 

30.  "The  Gildersleeve,  Springer,  Joseph  Combination."  Undated  manuscript  in  the 
Ross  Papers.  See  also  Napoleon  B.  Laughlin  to  Ross,  April  (n.d.)   1886. 

31.  "The  Gildersleeve,  Springer,  Joseph  Combination"  ;  McDowell,  The  Opposition 
to  Statehood,  p.  4. 

32.  "The  Gildersleeve,  Springer,  Joseph  Combination." 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  187 

rassing  difficulty  here  was  that  Thornton  was  actually  a  law 
partner  of  Thomas  Benton  Catron,  whom  many  thought  was 
— with  Stephen  B.  Elkins — the  brains  behind  the  Santa  Fe 
Ring.  Here  Ross  had  discovered,  incidentally,  why  the  Santa 
Fe  Ring  was  so  successful  and  yet  such  an  enigma :  it  con- 
sisted of  the  leaders  of  both  parties,  and  of  many  rings  within 
the  larger  one.  To  use  Ross'  own  words,  each  combination 
had,  for  example,  a  Republican  and  a  Democratic  lawyer 
within  its  ranks  "for  prudential  reasons  so  that  whichever 
side  might  come  uppermost,  the  dominant  party  was 
represented."33 

All  the  evils  that  had  presumably  been  thrown  out  of  the 
front  door  could  march  back  through  the  rear  entrance  if 
Ross  and  the  reform  Democrats  both  in  New  Mexico  and 
Washington  were  not  careful.  Determined  to  check  Gilder- 
sleeve  wherever  he  could,  Ross  became  a  candidate  for  the 
governorship  upon  the  news  of  Cleveland's  election.  He  was 
no  reluctant  Cincinnatus  dragged  from  rural  Kansas,  but 
an  active  lobbyist  in  his  own  cause.  He  wrote  Cleveland  ask- 
ing for  the  position  of  governor,  got  Burke  as  a  Republican 
editor  to  endorse  his  appointment,  and  persuaded  Albuquer- 
que friends  to  protest  the  possible  appointment  of  L.  S.  Trim- 
ble to  the  position.  His  friend,  S.  M.  Ashenfelter,  kept  up  an 
editorial  crusade  to  get  rid  of  Gildersleeve  and  all  rings.  Ross 
himself  went  to  Washington  where  he  found  Joseph  and 
Gildersleeve  lobbying  for  other  candidates.  Much  to  the  sur- 
prise of  the  New  Mexican  press,  and  probably  to  the  great 
surprise  and  disappointment  of  Gildersleeve,  Ross  had  soon 
edged  out  the  other  candidates.34  He  received  the  appoint- 
ment in  May,  1885. 

To  secure  office  then,  Ross  had  to  fight  both  the  regular 
Republican  and  Democratic  machines — if  the  informal,  log- 
rolling factions  that  went  under  those  names  in  New  Mexico 

33.  Ross  to  John  O'Grady  (copy),  March  26,  1887;  William  A.  Keleher,  The  Fabu- 
lous Frontier  (Santa  Fe,  1945),  p.  104n. 

34.  Ross  to  Grover  Cleveland   (copy)   Washington,  April  30,  1885;  W.  S.  Burke  to 
Grover  Cleveland,  May  20,   1885  ;  manuscript  "Petition"  of  Albuquerque  citizens,   1885. 
Ross  Papers. 

Southwest  Sentinel,  March  7  and  21,  1885. 

The  Las  Vegas  Daily  Optic,  April  24,  1885,  thought  that  William  T.  Thornton  had 
the  best  chance  of  becoming  governor  and  that  Ross  was  only  third  in  line. 


188  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

can  be  called  that.  His  correspondence  reveals  particularly 
the  complexity  and  bitterness  of  the  intra-party  fight.  Early 
in  March,  1885,  W.  B.  Childers,  an  Albuquerque  lawyer, 
warned  him  that  Thornton,  while  appearing  friendly  to  Ross* 
cause,  was  actually  seeking  the  governorship  for  himself.35 
Three  weeks  later,  George  W.  Fox  wrote  from  Socorro  that 
Delegate  Joseph  was  "against"  him.36  A  year  later,  while 
still  awaiting  Senate  confirmation,  Ross  learned  through  Sen- 
ator Manderson  of  Kansas  that  his  own  party  chairman,  Gil- 
dersleeve,  had  preferred  some  ten  charges  against  Ross  in  a 
secret  letter  to  the  Senate  Committee  on  Territories.  Among 
the  charges  was  the  accusation  that  Ross,  by  pretending  to 
be  "Montezuma"  on  inauguration  day,  had  mocked  the  reli- 
gion of  the  local  Indians  and  had  so  shocked  their  sensibilities 
that  it  had  made  Indian-white  relations  in  New  Mexico  im- 
measurably more  difficult.37 

What  a  contrast  is  this  intricate  struggle  to  the  Denver 
newspaper's  halcyon  description  of  Ross  as  an  obscure  old 
man  who  first  learned  that  he  was  Governor  while  working 
in  the  typesetting  room,  where,  as  the  news  of  his  appoint- 
ment spread,  an  amazed  family  and  a  disbelieving  set  of 
friends  gathered  about  him  to  offer  congratulations.38 


After  such  complicated  preliminaries,  it  still  remains  to 
be  seen  what  sort  of  administration  Governor  Ross  conducted. 
Ralph  E.  Twitchell,  no  friend  of  the  Kansan,  termed  it  a  fi- 
asco. Under  Ross,  he  wrote,  "Cleveland's  officials  organized  an 
assault  upon  the  titles  of  lands  in  New  Mexico  .  .  .  [which 
for]  virulence  of  action  and  incapacity  of  management  has 
never  found  a  parallel  in  the  history  of  the  United  States."39 
L.  Bradford  Prince,  Ross'  successor  in  office  wrote:  "Abso- 
lutely honest  and  well  meaning  but  proud  of  his  firmness,  he 
[Ross]  antagonized  his  own  party  as  well  as  the  Republican 

85.  W.  B.  Childers  to  Ross,  March  3,  1885.  Ross  Papers. 

86.  George  W.  Fox  to  Ross,  March  21,  1885.  Ross  Papers. 

37.  Senators  M.  C.  Butler  and  Charles  F.  Manderson  to  Ross  (n.d.)  in  "Letters 
Received,  March  to  April,  1886,"  Ross  Papers.  See  also  Edward  L.  Bartlett  to  Ross,  April 
20,  1886;  and  Napoleon  B.  Laughlin  to  Ross,  April  (n.d.)  1886. 

88.  Denver  Opinion,  July  18,  1885. 

89.  Twitchell,  II,  p.  498. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  189 

legislature,  and  was  soon  powerless  to  accomplish  anything." 
Ross'  administration,  he  concluded,  was  "quite  barren  of 
result."40  Charles  Coan  and  Helen  Haines,  each  with  a  one 
sentence  reference  to  Ross,  and  Maurice  Fulton  and  Paul 
Horgan  by  their  complete  silence  in  New  Mexico's  Own 
Chronicle,  would  seem  to  concur.41 

Besides  the  difficulties  with  his  local  party  Ross  was  ham- 
pered at  the  outset  by  an  uncongenial  set  of  federal  officers 
with  whom  to  work.  While  Secretary  Lane  and  Attorney  Gen- 
eral Smith  cooperated  with  Ross,  and  the  venerable  Surveyor 
General,  George  W.  Julian,  became  Ross'  most  trusted  politi- 
cal friend,  they  were  only  the  "reform"  appointees.24  Political 
realities  demanded  that  Congressman  William  M.  Springer, 
chairman  of  the  House  Committee  on  Territories,  Delegate 
Joseph,  and  Gildersleeve  control  most  of  the  patronage.  The 
new  chief  justice,  William  A.  Vincent,  consequently  proved 
to  be  a  friend  of  Congressman  Springer  and  ex-Senator  Dor- 
sey,  and  eventually  a  willing  advocate  of  the  Santa  Fe  Ring.43 
The  new  United  States  marshal,  Romulo  Martinez,  was  so 
deeply  involved  in  a  fight  over  the  legal  ownership  of  the 
Canon  del  Agua  Grant  that  his  worth  seemed  questionable  to 
Ross.44  While  Ross  did  work  with  Judge  Elisha  V.  Long  and 
Judge  Henderson,  he  distrusted  Reuben  A.  Reeves.45  It  was 
in  Reeves'  court  that  many  of  Ross'  executive  acts  were  de- 
clared invalid.46 

Although  the  Delegate  Antonio  Joseph  was  not  technically 
a  federal  official  in  the  sense  that  the  judges  and  Ross  were, 
much  of  Ross'  program  depended  upon  Congressional  legis- 

40.  Prince,  Concise  History,  pp.  205-206. 

41.  Charles  F.  Coan,  A  History  of  New  Mexico  (Chicago,  1925),  p.  407. 
Helen  Haines,  History  of  New  Mexico  (N.Y.,  1891),  p.  254. 

Maurice  G.  Fulton  and  Paul  Horgan,  New  Mexico's  Own  Chronicle  (Dallas,  1937). 

42.  Leis,  "Memoirs  of  Ross." 

43.  Ross   had   not  been   in   office  a  full  three  months  when   it  was   disclosed   that 
Vincent  had   so   compromised   himself   in    rulings  on    land   cases   involving  his   friend 
Senator  Dorsey  that  Cleveland  removed  him.  Instead  of  leaving  the  territory,  however, 
Vincent  stayed  on  to  become  a  lawyer  for  the  very  interests  Ross  was  fighting. 

"The  Gildersleeve,  Springer,  Joseph  Combination"  ;  see  also  Arie  W.  Poldervaart, 
Black-Robed  Justice  (Santa  Fe,  1948),  p.  135. 

44.  "The  Gildersleeve,  Springer,  Joseph  Combination." 

45.  Ross  to  Van   H.  Manning,   Santa  Fe,  January   15,    1886,   describes   the  subtle 
pressures  of  land-grant  interests  on  the  federal  judges.  Ross  papers. 

46.  Rio  Grande  Republican,  January  22,  1887.    (Bancroft). 


190  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

lation  and  support  from  Washington.  While  he  and  Joseph 
maintained  the  most  cordial  public  relations,  and  their  cor- 
respondence was  Chesterfieldian  in  its  politeness  and  urban- 
ity, Joseph  either  by  disinterest  or  subtle  opposition  often 
defeated  some  of  Ross'  most  treasured  goals.  Ross  himself 
appeared  frequently  in  Washington  during  his  term  of  office 
to  lobby  for  certain  causes  in  which  Joseph  had  no  interest. 
Isolated  from  much  of  his  own  party  and  many  of  the 
local  officials,  it  was  but  natural  that  Ross  should  turn  to  a 
man  with  views  about  New  Mexico  that  were  almost  identical 
to  his  own.  This  was  Surveyor  General  George  W.  Julian. 
Like  the  governor,  Julian  had  a  national  reputation  as  a  fear- 
less and  incorruptible  man,  and  as  a  public  lands  expert  as 
well.47  Cleveland  had  appointed  the  Hoosier  statesman  in  the 
hope  that  he  could  solve  the  labyrinthine  tangle  that  en- 
meshed the  Spanish  and  Mexican  land  grants  in  New  Mexico. 
Constantly  encouraged  by  letters  and  notes  from  Secretary 
of  the  Interior  Lamar  and  Land  Commissioner  Sparks  to  con- 
tinue the  good  work  of  "reformation  and  restoration,"  the 
two  men  struggled  to  settle  the  land  grants  once  and  for  all.48 
Unfortunately  Julian  took  the  view  that  truly  Draconian 
measures  must  be  employed.  After  casting  doubt  on  all  the 
decisions  of  his  predecessors  in  the  Surveyor  General's  office, 
he  announced  that  ninety  per  cent  of  all  the  land  entries  in 
the  territory  were  fraudulent.49  While  this  statistic  was  prob- 
ably correct,  it  also  struck  at  every  citizen  of  means  in  New 
Mexico  and  at  the  livelihood  of  the  entire  legal  profession 
there.  Much  of  the  intense  bitterness  over  Ross'  administra- 
tion was  actually  caused  by  Julian's  ruthless  scrutiny  of  land 
records  and  his  scathing  reports  to  Washington.  Julian's  find- 
ings led  to  the  arrest  of  former  Land  Register  Max  Frost  on 
charges  of  fraudulent  land  entry  and  his  conviction  in  a  trial 

47.  "George  W.  Julian,"  in  the  Dictionary  of  American  Biography,  X,  245-246. 

48.  L.Q.C.  Lamar  to  Ross,  September  23,  1885  ;  A.  J.  Sparks  to  Ross,  November  7, 
1887.  In  acknowledging  Ross'  Annual  Report,  Sparks  wrote  "In  the  name  of  the  home- 
seekers  I  thank  you.  Let  the  good  work  go  on.  The  Land  "grabbing"  rascals  will  die 
hard,  but  as  sure  as  God  is  just  we'll  beat  them."  Ross  Papers. 

49.  See  a  review  and  comments  on  Julian's  assertion  in  the  Deming  Headlight,  Sep- 
tember 19,  1886.  Ross  upheld  Julian's  "90%"  figure  in  his  1887  message  to  the  Assembly. 
For  comments  on  his  stand,  see  the  Rio  Grande  Republican,  January  1,  1887. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  191 

before  Judge  Long.50  Julian  also  summarized  his  investiga- 
tions in  a  blunt  article  for  the  North  American  Review  in 
which  he  fiercely  denounced  ex-Senator  Dorsey,  and  called 
Gildersleeve  a  politician  "for  revenue  only."51  The  hornet's 
nest  had  been  stirred ;  and  the  effects  soon  began  to  appear. 
Senator  Preston  B.  Plumb  of  Kansas  warned  Ross  that  letters 
were  pouring  into  Washington  complaining  that  Julian's 
methods  had  brought  all  business  in  New  Mexico  to  a  stand- 
still, since  no  one  was  sure  of  title  to  property.52  In  a  slap  at 
Julian  and  the  Cleveland  administration,  the  1886  Demo- 
cratic Territorial  Convention  unanimously  adopted  a  resolu- 
tion to  play  down  land  frauds,  and  Delegate  Joseph  success- 
fully ran  for  re-election  on  such  a  ticket.53  Julian  was  accurate 
in  his  charges,  and  undoubtedly  had  the  future  good  of  New 
Mexico  at  heart,  but  his  public  diatribes  only  increased  the 
difficulties  under  which  Ross  labored. 

While  being  so  closely  identified  with  Julian,  Ross  also 
attracted  criticism  by  appointing  members  of  his  family  to 
office.  One  of  his  sons  functioned  as  his  personal  secretary 
while  another  worked  for  Julian.  His  son-in-law,  Thomas  P. 
Gable,  became  warden,  while  he  chose  his  nephew  by  mar- 
riage, S.  M.  Ashenfelter,  as  district  attorney  for  the  third 
district  court.  Later  he  replaced  Gable  with  still  another 
relative,  H.C.  Bennett,  his  brother-in-law. 

Within  his  own  executive  branch  Ross  faced  a  complicated 
problem:  somehow,  he  had  to  oust  Republican  appointees 
from  important  territorial  (as  opposed  to  federal)  offices 
such  as  those  of  treasurer,  attorney  general  and  district  attor- 
ney before  he  could  put  a  Democratic  administration  into 
gear.  A  territorial  court  ruling  of  1880,  however,  declared 
that  the  incumbents  of  territorial  office  could  hold  their  posi- 
tions for  two  years  from  time  of  appointment,  or  until  the 

50.  Twitchell,  II,  498n. 

51.  George  W.  Julian,   "Land  Stealing  in  New  Mexico,"  North  American  Review 
(July  1,  1887),  pp.  27-30.  See  also  Harold  H.  Dunham,  Government  Handout:  A  Study 
in  the  Administration  of  the  Public  Lands  (New  York,  1941),  p.  180  ff. 

52.  Preston  B.  Plumb  to  Ross,  July  9,  1886.  Ross  Papers. 

A  typical  New  Mexican  reacton  to  Julian's  charges  may  be  found  in  the  Rio  Grande 
Republican,  July  16,  1887. 

53.  Julian,  "Land  Stealing  in  New  Mexico,"  pp.  28-29. 


192  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

biennial  legislature  should  again  meet  and  confirm  their  suc- 
cessors. Governor  Sheldon  had  shrewdly  reappointed  all  these 
officials  just  before  leaving  office,  and  since  the  legislature  did 
not  meet  again  until  the  winter  of  1886-87  it  meant  that  Ross 
would  normally  have  to  wait  over  a  year  to  replace  these  men. 
Like  the  man  he  had  refused  to  impeach  in  1868,  Ross  himself 
was  now  faced  with  a  local  "tenure  of  office  act"  which  had 
been  designed  to  curb  the  governor's  power.  By  dint  of  per- 
suasion Ross  secured  two  resignations,  but  his  chief  stum- 
bling blocks  were  Colonel  William  Breeden,  the  territorial 
attorney  general,  and  Antonio  Ortiz  y  Salazar,  the  territorial 
treasurer.  Breeden  was  also  the  chairman  of  the  Republican 
party  and  further,  under  Governor  Sheldon's  lax  hand,  had 
become  virtually  the  acting  governor  of  New  Mexico.54  Self- 
confident,  opinionated,  a  good  fighter  and  a  good  hater,  he 
obstructed  Ross'  every  move  during  the  latter's  first  year  in 
office. 

Sorely  troubled  by  the  continued  presence  of  these  Repub- 
lican officers,  Ross  badgered  the  United  States  Attorney  Gen- 
eral A.  H.  Garland  for  legal  opinions  as  to  how  he  could  re- 
move them.55 

It  is  very  important  to  the  success  of  my  administration 
that  I  should  remove  these  officials,  if  I  have  the  power,  and 
not  remain  responsible  for  their  continuance  in  office.  .  .  . 

The  conditions  here  are  peculiar,  and  of  such  a  character 
that  I  cannot  afford  to  make  a  mistake  by  allowing  myself  to 
be  hurried  beyond  my  judgment.  To  attempt  these  removals  and 
be  beaten  in  the  Courts,  although  the  intelligent  Republican 
sentiment  might  be  with  me,  would  be  an  almost  fatal  mistake, 
while  a  successful  attempt  at  removal  would  at  once  create  a 
complete  political  revolution,  so  prone  is  the  great  mass  of  the 
people  here,  the  native  element,  to  go  with  the  winning  party  in 
a  controversy. 

Washington  was  of  little  help  in  this  matter,  so  Ross  fi- 
nally decided  that  he  must  act  regardless  of  the  consequences. 
After  waiting  some  six  months  he  asked  the  resignation  of 

54.  Ross  to  Attorney  General  A.  H.  Garland,  Santa  Fe,  August  24,  1885  ;  see  also 
Ross  to  Van  H.  Manning,  Santa  Fe,  January  15,  1886.  Ross  Papers. 
56.  Ross  to  Garland,  August  24,  1885. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  193 

E.  C.  Wade  as  district  attorney  of  the  third  judicial  district. 
Wade  refused  to  resign  and  Judge  Reeves  upheld  Wade's  con- 
tention.56 Defeated  in  the  courts,  Ross  tried  another  tack  with 
Colonel  Breeden.  By  November,  1885,  he  felt  that  he  had 
enough  evidence  of  misconduct  in  office  to  suspend  Breeden. 
Using  the  trusted  medium  of  the  press,  he  fired  that  obstrep- 
erous official  in  a  broadside  proclamation  the  language  of 
which  electrified  the  territory : 57 

As  to  the  "cause"  for  your  suspension  .  .  .  you  were  sus- 
pended for  drunkenness,  licentiousness,  gambling,  and  misfeas- 
ance, malfeasance  and  nonfeasance  in  office;  crimes  which 
ought  not  be  tolerated  in  a  public  official. 

In  replacing  Breeden  Ross  attempted  to  make  peace  with 
some  of  the  factions  in  his  own  party.  He  approached  his  for- 
mer competitor  for  the  governorship,  W.  T.  Thornton,  with 
the  proposal  that  if  Thornton  would  end  his  law  partnership 
with  T.  B.  Catron,  Ross  would  make  him  attorney  general. 
Thornton  refused  to  accept  the  conditions,  and  Ross  appointed 
Napoleon  B.  Laughlin  in  his  stead.58 At  the  same  time  Ross 
supported  another  competitor  for  the  governorship,  Romulo 
Martinez,  for  the  marshalship.59  These  efforts  at  cooperation 
with  the  other  wings  of  the  Democratic  party  appeared  to 
have  had  little  practical  effect,  however. 

Ross  waited  until  July,  1886,  to  remove  Ortiz  y  Salazar, 
the  territorial  treasurer.  Again  he  used  the  method  of  public 
proclamation.  Charging  Ortiz  y  Salazar  with  having  specu- 
lated in  territorial  warrants  and  with  mismanagement  of 
funds  designed  for  building  the  territorial  penitentiary,  he 
removed  him  and  appointed  Bernard  Seligman  in  his  place.60 

Knowing  that  the  legislature  might  not  confirm  his  new 
choices,  Ross  tried  to  get  Congress  to  pass  a  bill  reapportion- 

56.  Ross  to  E.  C.  Wade,  October  22,  1885. 

57.  Ross    to    William    Breeden,    Santa    Fe,    November    13,    1885 ;    see    also    printed 
"Broadside"  published  November  24,  1885.  Ross  Papers. 

58.  Ross  to  Van  H.  Manning;,  Santa  Fe,  January  15,  1886.  Ross  Papers. 

59.  Ross  to  Senator  John  J.  Ingalls,  June  3,  1886,  in  which  Ross  urged  that  Judges 
Long  and  Henderson,  and  Attorney  General  Smith  be  continued  in  office. 

60.  See  Public  Letter  of  Ross  to  Ortfz  y  Salazar,  July  28,  1886.  Ross  Papers.  The 
Las  Vegas  Chronicle,  August  18,  1886,  contains  an  account  of  the  Ross-Salazar  fight. 
(Bancroft). 


194  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ing  the  gerrymandered  legislative  New  Mexican  districts  so 
that  a  more  amenable  body  might  be  elected  to  the  1886-87 
session.61  With  opposition  from  Gildersleeve  at  home  and  with 
luke-warm  support  from  Joseph,  this  plan  failed.  Having 
tangled  with  the  courts,  Ross'  "interference"  with  the  legis- 
lative branch  naturally  embittered  his  relations  with  the 
members  of  the  27th  Assembly.  They  convened  in  1887  ready 
with  mailed  fist  to  do  battle  with  the  Kansas  interloper.  Al- 
though the  Republicans  had  only  a  slight  majority  in  either 
House,  they  were  so  tightly  and  brilliantly  controlled  by  a 
caucus  system  set  up  and  run  by  Colonel  Chavez  that  Ross 
could  never  break  the  phalanx.62  And  to  hamper  Ross  still 
further,  in  the  fall  of  1886  the  lawyers  of  New  Mexico  had 
formed  a  Bar  Association  with  none  other  than  ex-Judge 
William  Vincent  as  its  president.  Whenever  the  legislature 
considered  a  bill,  it  went  to  the  Bar  Association  for  approval 
first ;  and  if  it  did  not  approve,  the  bill  went  no  further.63  This 
was  even  more  the  case  in  1889  when  the  Bar  virtually  wrote 
and  introduced  every  act  passed. 

The  complicated  infighting  which  characterized  Ross'  re- 
lations with  the  27th  legislature  need  not  be  detailed  here. 
Suffice  it  to  say  that  he  vetoed  some  twenty-five  percent  of 
the  bills  passed  by  the  Assembly,  and  it,  in  retaliation,  em- 
barrassed him  at  every  turn.  Ross,  for  example,  was  soon  at 
loggerheads  with  the  solons  over  his  direction  of  the  new  peni- 
tentiary.64 In  seeking  someone  he  could  trust,  Ross  quite  un- 
wisely appointed  his  son-in-law,  Thomas  P.  Gable  as  Warden. 
The  newspapers  quickly  filled  with  innuendoes  about  the 

61.  Antonio  Joseph  to  Ross,  May  31,  1886 ;  Shelby  M.  Cullom  to  Ross,  June  3,  1886 ; 
Benjamin  Harrison  to  Ross,  June  7,  1886.  In  his  letter  Harrison  indicated  that  he  dis- 
approved of  the  reappointment  scheme  as  federal  interference  with  local  government. 
Ross  Papers. 

62.  Ross  to  L.  Q.  C.  Lamar,  January  26,  1887. 

Joseph  had  warned  Ross  in  1886  that  he  must  get  Frank  Manzanares  to  persuade 
Don  Candelario  Garcia  to  vote  Democratic  in  order  to  control  the  Council.  Garcia,  who 
posed  as  an  "independent"  in  a  council  divided  into  six  Republicans  and  five  Democrats, 
finally  found  the  opposition  more  attractive.  Joseph  to  Ross,  Ojo  Caliente,  November 
24.  1886. 

A  good  analysis  of  the  makeup  of  the  27th  Assembly  may  be  found  in  the  Deming 
Headlight,  January  2,  1887. 

68.  Prince,  Concise  History,  p.  206. 

64.  See  references  to  the  penitentiary  fight  in  the  Santa  Fe  New  Mexican,  February 
1  to  March  80,  paesim;  see  also  "Letters  Received,  January-February-March,  1887"  in 
Ross  Papers. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  195 

"Gable-Ross  syndicate,"  nepotism,  and  the  like.  The  pettiness 
of  the  conflict  is  revealed  by  Gildersleeve's  writing  a  letter  to 
the  Secretary  of  the  Interior  accusing  Ross  of  stealing  stone 
from  the  penitentiary  for  his  own  use.66  And  as  Ross  had 
feared,  the  Assembly  declined  to  confirm  Seligman  as  treas- 
urer, to  seat  Henry  L.  Warren  as  attorney  general  (N.  B. 
Laughlin  had  declined  the  appointment)  or  to  accept  two  new 
appointees  for  positions  of  district  attorney.67  Finally,  the 
Assembly  defeated  a  good  public  school  bill  which  had  been 
backed  by  Ross.68 

Despite  the  actual  defeat  of  every  item  of  his  program, 
Ross'  fighting  spirit  was  never  stronger.  It  was  now  that  he 
"rejoiced  in  opposition,"  to  use  Prince's  phrase.  In  a  letter  to 
John  O'Grady,  a  newspaper  friend  in  St.  Louis,  he  admitted 
that  the  legislature  might  make  him  seem  such  a  terrible 
executive  that  Cleveland  would  ask  for  his  resignation.  If 
that  happened,  he  predicted  they  would  then  move  against 
Julian  and  Attorney  General  Smith.  He  also  confessed  that 
his  enemies  had  large  newspaper  backing.  But  he  was  opti- 
mistic about  the  long-range  effects  :69 

This  crusade  is  tending  to  a  reorganization  of  party  lines 
here.  All  fair-minded,  law  abiding  people,  Republicans  as  well 
as  Democrats,  are  disgusted  with  the  composition  and  course 
of  the  majority  in  the  late  Legislature 

In  the  same  letter  Ross  drew  an  ironic  parallel  between 
his  fight  with  the  New  Mexican  Assembly  and  that  of  himself 
and  Johnson  with  a  Radical  Congress.  Then  he  threw  down 
the  gauntlet : 

I  defy  them  now  as  on  the  other  occasion  cited,  to  do  their 
worst.  This  is  1887,  not  1868 This  has  become  a  fight  to  the 


65.  Pamphlet:  The  Other  Side — Warden  Gable's  Reply  (Las  Vegas,  1887),  in  Ross 
Papers.  See  also  Rio  Grande  Republican,  March  5,  1887. 

Ross  made  the  further  mistake  of  appointing  his  brother  in  law,  H.  C.  Bennett,  to 
replace  Gable.  See  criticism  of  the  appointment  in  the  Deming  Headlight,  October 
28,  1887. 

66.  Gildersleeve  to  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior    (copy),  February  26,   1886.  Ross 
Papers. 

67.  Ross  to  L.  Q.  C.  Lamar,  January  26,  1887,  in  Ross  "Letterbook,"  Ross  Papers. 

68.  Ross  to  John  O'Grady,  March  26,  1887. 

69.  Ibid. 


196  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

death,  it  will  go  on  till  I  am  killed  or  out  of  office  or  the  thieves 
in  prison. 


Before  the  next  Assembly  was  to  meet,  Ross  became  in- 
volved in  less  dramatic  but  extremely  important  disputes 
over  the  economic  destiny  of  New  Mexico.  Here  again  he  was 
forced  into  the  role  of  a  fighting  minority,  even  within  his 
own  party  ranks.  True  to  his  Kansas  free-soil  convictions 
and  philosophy,  Ross  dreamed  of  a  New  Mexico  populated 
by  homesteading  family  farmers  who  boasted  an  American 
background.  He  constructed  an  attractive  catechism  of  New 
Mexican  development  which  he  pursued  by  speech  and  deed 
for  the  rest  of  his  life.  It  ran  as  follows :  settle  the  Spanish  and 
Mexican  land  grant  tangle  by  a  special  federal  commission  or 
court.  Once  title  is  cleared,  reserve  these  public  lands  for 
homesteaders  rather  than  ranchers,  the  small  farm  to  be 
made  feasible  by  government  irrigation  projects  which  would 
supply  water  at  cost  to  the  settler.70  Simultaneously,  mining 
should  be  encouraged  both  by  the  importation  of  capital  and 
the  building  of  railroads.  The  farmer  would  therefore  have  a 
ready  made  local  market  in  the  mining  communities,  while 
the  mining  companies  and  the  railroads  would  furnish  the 
economic  means  to  bring  schools,  proper  political  organiza- 
tions, civilization,  and  statehood.  In  every  annual  report,  in 
every  speech,  he  recited  this  plan.  And  while  Ross  may  not  be 
counted  as  one  of  New  Mexico's  most  popular  or  successful 
governors,  he  had  nevertheless  such  a  thorough  and  signifi- 
cant free  soil  theory  of  colonial  maturation,  that  had  he  been 
successful  he  would  have  been  indeed  a  "Montezuma"  for 
New  Mexico. 

In  what  ways  did  he  attempt  to  make  his  program  or 
"credo"  a  reality?  In  his  annual  reports  to  the  Secretary  of 
the  Interior  Ross  at  first  urged  the  creation  of  a  Federal  Com- 
mission (this  was  the  era  of  the  Utah,  Civil  Service,  and 
Interstate  Commerce  Commissions)  to  settle  land  problems. 
He  persuaded  Joseph  to  introduce  a  bill  to  Congress  to  that 

70.  Report  of  the  Governor  of  New  Mexico  to  the  Secretary  of  th«  Interior,  1886 
(Washington,  1886),  p.  8. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  197 

effect.71  He  also  asked  prominent  New  Mexicans  to  go  to 
Washington  to  lobby  in  its  behalf.72  Ross  encountered  both 
the  opposition  of  Julian  and  United  States  Land  Commis- 
sioner Sparks,  however,  so  that  a  year  later  he  declared  in- 
stead for  the  creation  of  a  court  of  private  land  claims.73  He 
journeyed  to  Washington  to  testify  in  favor  of  its  creation. 
Upon  discovering  that  the  proposed  court  was  to  sit  exclu- 
sively in  the  national  capital,  he  conducted  a  campaign  to 
amend  the  act  so  that  the  court  must  convene  in  the  territories 
affected.  Only  in  this  way,  Ross  thought,  could  the  small 
claimant  bear  the  expenses  of  a  trial.  When  the  McCreary 
Act  embodying  these  proposals  became  law  in  July,  1888, 
Delegate  Joseph  graciously  congratulated  Ross  on  having 
played  a  major  role  in  its  formulation  and  passage.74  Since 
Governor  Prince  somewhat  immodestly  takes  full  credit  for 
having  gotten  this  court,  and  Ralph  Twitchell  gives  Frank 
Springer  the  credit  for  its  creation,  it  seems  only  fair — given 
the  actual  history  of  the  origins  of  this  court — to  let  Ross 
share  some  of  the  laurels  too.75 

An  incidental  obstacle  to  the  achievement  of  Ross'  New 
Mexican  "utopia"  was  the  Indian  problem.  When  renegade 
Apaches  led  by  Geronimo  and  other  chiefs  went  on  the  war- 
path in  the  fall  of  1885,  the  settlers  and  miners  of  southwest- 
ern New  Mexico  and  portions  of  Arizona  besieged  Ross  with 
panic-stricken  reports.  Angered  by  the  slow  movements  of 
General  Crook,  and  acutely  distrustful  of  Crook's  use  of 
Indian  scouts,  Ross  in  a  joint  letter  signed  by  all  federal  New 
Mexican  officials  asked  Cleveland  to  remove  Crook  and  ap- 

71.  Report  of  the  Governor  of  New  Mexico  to  the  Secretary  of  the  Interior,  1885 
(Washington,  1885),  pp.  4-5.  See  also  Antonio  Joseph  to  Ross,  May  31,  1886,  and  July 
19,  1886.  Ross  Papers. 

72.  Ross'  efforts  to  raise  a  delegation  of  influential  New  Mexicans  to  go  to  Washing- 
ton to  force  settlement  of  land  titles  are  revealed  mostly  by  the  replies  of  the  men 
approached.  See  the  letters  of  Roman  Baca,  Antonio  Joseph,  A.  J.  Fountain,  Thomas 
Dorsey,  John  A.  Lee,  Nicolas  and  Nestor  Armijo,  W.  B.  Childers,  H.  M.  Meredith,  to 
Ross  in  "Letters  Received,  November-December,  1887,"  Ross  Papers. 

73.  Senate  Executive  Document  No.  136.  49th  Cong.,  1st.  Sess. ;  see  also  Ross'  testi- 
mony  before  the   Committee  on    Private   Land   Claims   on   July   26,    1888,   extracts   of 
which  may  be  found  in  his  "Political  Speeches,"  in  the  Rosa  Papers. 

Julian,  "Land  Stealing  in  New  Mexico,"  pp.  29-30. 

74.  Telegram  of  Antonio  Joseph  to  Ross,  July  25,  1888 ;  letter  of  Joseph  to  Ross, 
July  30,  1888.  Ross  Papers. 

75.  Prince,  Concise  History,  p.  207  ;  Twitchell,  II,  462-467. 


198  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

point  General  Nelson  A.  Miles  in  his  stead.76  He  pressed  Gov- 
ernor Zulick  of  Arizona  to  do  the  same.77  Ross  was  also  highly 
indignant  that  certain  eastern  papers  were  suggesting  at  this 
time  that  the  settlers  were  playing  up  an  Indian  war  in  order 
to  sell  agricultural  goods  at  premium  prices  to  troops.78  Far 
from  being  a  sentimental  humanitarian,  Ross  stood  for  any 
Indian  policy,  no  matter  how  harsh,  which  would  allow  the 
settler  to  come  in.  On  the  Indian  issue,  at  least,  Ross  and  the 
territory  were  united.  It  is  fitting  in  a  way  that  the  last  Indian 
outbreak  in  New  Mexican  history  should  be  ended  during 
Ross'  "no  nonsense  and  no  pampering"  administration.  Nor 
is  it  surprising  to  find  that  he  supported  the  Dawes  Severalty 
Act,  which  in  theory  turned  the  Indian  into  a  homesteading 
farmer.79 

By  advocating  homestead  policies,  Ross  inevitably  came 
into  conflict  with  the  range  cattleman  just  when  the  latter 
was  in  his  heyday.  Although  mining  provided  some  $€,000,000 
in  wealth  annually  for  New  Mexico  in  1886,  the  product  of 
the  cattle  industry  that  year  was  estimated  at  $13,000,000.80 
Moreover,  it  was  Texas  cattlemen  and  ranchers  who  com- 
prised an  important  section  of  the  territorial  Democratic 
party.  Nevertheless,  when  Ross  learned  that  the  Lincoln 
County  Stock  Association  was  harassing  sheep  men  in  that 
district,  his  sympathies  were  immediately  on  the  side  of  the 
sheep  men.81  By  correspondence  with  local  democrats  and 
sympathetic  editors  Ross  discreetly  collected  evidence  about 
these  conflicts.  The  more  he  learned  the  less  he  approved  of 
cattlemen  in  general.  He  found,  for  example,  that  the  so-called 
"quarantine  laws"  designed  to  keep  diseases — and  notably 
Mexican  cattle — out  of  the  territory,  actually  had  the  practi- 

76.  Ross  to  Grover  Cleveland,  Santa  Fe,  November  7,  1885.  Ross  Papers.  See  also 
W.  H.  H.  Llewellyn  to  General  George  Crook,  January  30,   1886,  quoted  in  Katherine 
Shephard,  The  Miles-Crook  Controversy.  Unpublished  Master's  Thesis    (Department  of 
History,  University  of  New  Mexico,  1936),  p.  50. 

77.  Ross  to  Governor  G.   Meyer  Zulick,   Santa  Fe,   August  4,    1886.   MS.   letter  in 
Arizona  Territorial  Papers   (Arizona  State  Archives,  Phoenix). 

78.  Ross  to  Congressman  James  Laird,  Santa  Fe,  December  5,  1886.  Roes  Papers. 
78.  Ibid. 

80.  Hammond  and  Donnelly,  The  Story  of  New  Mexico,  p.  137.  The  Stock  Grower 
(Las  Vegas),  February  11,  1888. 

81.  to  Ross,  Fort  Stanton,  June  22,  1885  ;  John  Y.  Hewitt  to  Ross,  White 

Oaks,  New  Mexico,  June  23,  1885.  Ross  Papers. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  199 

cal  effect  of  reserving  the  range  for  those  cattlemen  who  were 
already  in  New  Mexico.  Many  local  ranchers  were,  in  fact, 
smuggling  more  cattle  in  from  Mexico  in  order  to  hold  larger 
range  plots.82  Since  the  sheriff  of  Lincoln  County  was  also 
the  vice-president  of  the  Cattle  Association  there,  Ross  knew 
that  he  was  not  a  very  reliable  instrument  of  justice  where 
sheep  men  were  concerned.83  But  to  Ross  the  injustice  went 
further  than  that.  To  him  the  ranching  industry  implied  a 
sparse  population,  huge  landed  estates — which  he  called  "a 
constant  menace  to  popular  government" — and  oligarchic 
rule.  It  does  not  seem  too  far-fetched  to  suggest  that  Ross  saw 
in  the  rancher  the  threat  to  freedom  that  he  saw  in  the  slave- 
owning  planter  in  Kansas  in  1856. 

Typical  of  Ross'  difficulties  in  bringing  about  justice  in 
a  cattle-sheep  conflict  was  his  experience  in  dealing  with  one 
E.  Carlisle,  a  rancher  living  on  the  New  Mexico-Colorado 
border.  In  the  winter  of  1885-86  Ross  learned  that  two  Du- 
rango  cowboys  employed  by  Carlisle  had  shot  and  killed  a 
New  Mexican  sheep  herder  with  the  improbable  name  of 
Ricardo  Jacques.  A  mock  trial  had  been  held,  during  which 
the  friends  of  the  cowboys  had  brought  their  guns  into  the 
courtroom  and  had  held  a  cocked  Winchester  on  any  witness 
thought  to  be  hostile.  Ross'  investigation  also  revealed  that 
Carlisle  had  wired  Attorney  General  Breeden  to  get  his  men 
"off."  As  the  unpleasant  facts  came  in  the  Governor  con- 
cluded that  not  only  had  injustice  been  done,  but  that  Car- 
lisle's was  a  "hurrah"  outfit  which  had  caused  trouble  with 
Indians  in  that  section;  and  further,  as  Coloradoans,  had 
actually  poached  on  New  Mexican  soil  traditionally  reserved 
for  sheep  herders.84  Nothing  in  Ross'  whole  career  excited 
him  more  than  this  type  of  evasion  of  law  and  order.  In  a 
phillipic  to  Carlisle,  whom  he  considered  the  real  culprit  he 
declared  that : 


82.  J.  E.  Curren  to  Ross,  Lake  Valley,  New  Mexico,  July  7,  1885.  Ross  Papers. 

83.  Hewitt  to  Ross,  June  23,  1885.  Ross  Papers. 

84.  See  letters,  newspaper  clippings,  telegrams,  and  public  broadsides  in   "Cattle- 
Sheep   Wars"   folder,   Ross   Papers.   See  particularly   a  broadside   letter   from   Ross   to 
Carlisle,  February  9,  1886 ;  Carlisle  to  Ross,  Durango,  February  13,  1886 ;  Ross  to  J.  D. 
Warren,  February  16,  1886  ;  T.  D.  Burns  to  Ross,  Tierra  Amarilla,  February  17,  1886 ; 
Ross  to  Carlisle,  February  18,  1886 ;  Affidavit  of  Telesfor  Lopez,  March  8,  1886. 


200  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Your  employees  . . .  have  for  years  constituted  the  nucleus 
of  an  element  that  has  practically  terrorized  that  region  of 
country.  You  have  permitted  them  to  go  armed,  contrary  to 
the  laws  of  New  Mexico,  and  sustained  them  in  their  lawless 
proceedings,  till  a  reign  of  public  disorder  seems  imminent. 
You  have  the  power,  through  control  of  your  employees,  to  put 
a  stop  to  these  practices.  This,  I  insist  that  you  do  and  cause 
them  to  respect  the  equal  right  of  others,  and  the  law.  If  you  do 
not,  they  shall  be  arrested  and  punished,  or  driven  from  the 
Territory.85 

Ross  was  as  good  as  his  word  for  by  May,  1886,  the  Grand 
Jury  of  Coif  ax  County  had  indicted  William  Wilson  for  mur- 
der and  Lee  Hamblett  and  Stephen  Roupe  as  accessories,  and 
the  men  were  eventually  convicted.86  In  other  instances,  how- 
ever, Ross  failed  to  make  his  power  felt.  Evasive  and  laconic 
explanations  by  local  peace  officers  of  how  somebody  just 
happened  to  get  shot  by  "persons  unknown,"  or  who  had  obvi- 
ously let  the  guilty  parties  escape,  drew  from  Ross  thunderous 
reminders  that  they  must  do  their  duty  or  else.87  Nevertheless, 
the  cattle  and  sheep  "wars"  continued,  and  local  sheriffs  and 
juries  continued  to  favor  the  cattleman. 

Ross  expressed  his  anti-cattle  bias  in  his  first  annual 
report  to  the  Interior  Department  by  recommending  that 
there  be  no  further  disposal  of  public  lands  except  for  home- 
steading  purposes.88  In  subsequent  reports  he  commented  that 
the  cattleman's  theory  of  a  permanent  range  was  a  bad  one, 
for  a  cattle  frontier  was  by  nature  temporary.89  In  a  speech  to 
the  Aztec  Club  of  New  Mexico  in  July,  1885,  he  complimented 
the  cattlemen  upon  their  contribution  to  the  settlement  and 
wealth  of  the  territory,  but  he  warned  them  that  there  must 
be  order  between  them  and  the  sheep  interests.  That  order 
was  needed,  he  said,  so  people  would  migrate  to  New  Mexico. 
"People  are  worth  more  to  a  state  than  steers,"  he  exclaimed, 
. . .  "for  with  people  comes  capital  and  the  spirit  of  commercial 

85.  Ross  to  Carlisle,  February  9,  1886. 

86.  MS  Bills  of  Indictment  for  William  Wilson,  Lee  Hamblett,  and  Stephen  Roupe 
presented  by  the  Colfax  County  Grand  Jury,  1886. 

87.  See  "Proclamations"  in  Ross  Papers  for  one  to  force  sheriffs  "to  make  arrests." 

88.  Report  of  the  Governor  of  New  Mexico.  .  .  ,  1885,  pp.  7-8. 

89.  Report  of  the  Governor  of  New  Mexico.  .  .  ,  1887,  pp.  6-8. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  201 

adventure,  development,  prosperity,  and  greatness."90  Two 
years  later  he  bluntly  told  a  crowd  at  the  Territorial  Fair  that 
the  "granger  was  coming  and  coming  to  stay."91 

Naturally,  Ross'  position  caused  comment.  J.  E.  Curran, 
editor  of  the  Sierra  Grande  Press  wrote  in  the  fall  of  1885 : 

I  'love  you  for  the  enemies  you  have  made'.  The  rings  and 
cliques  don't  like  you.  The  Deming  ring  don't  like  you.  The 
Hopewell  and  Grayson  cattle  ring  are  down  on  you,  and  the 
Las  Cruces  gang  would  betray  you  first  chance.92 

A  week  later  Jesse  E.  Thompson,  the  Superintendent  of 
Public  Schools  in  Sierra,  warned  that  the  "Cattle  barons"  and 
"land  jobbers"  were  down  on  Ross  and  were  allied  with 
Breeden  and  Thornton.93 

It  would  seem  obvious  that  if  Ross  properly  fitted  the 
"rule  or  ruin"  role  conferred  upon  him  by  Max  Frost  and 
others,  he  would  have  gone  after  the  Maxwell  Land  Grant 
Company  and  Frank  Springer,  its  able  lawyer.  Here  was 
another  symbol  of  all  Ross  disliked :  the  seemingly  fraudulent 
land  grant  claim,  the  cattle  empire  with  an  anti-nester  policy, 
and  the  economic  tyrant  of  most  of  northeastern  New  Mexico. 
While  Surveyor  General  Julian  would  give  no  quarter  to  these 
interests,  Ross  steered  clear  of  the  perennial  feuds  and  im- 
broglios in  Colfax  County  as  much  as  possible.  He  carefully 
evaded  identification  with  Oscar  P.  McMains,  that  indefatiga- 
ble crusader  against  the  Maxwell  interests.  He  allowed  M.  W. 
Mills,  a  Republican  and  a  Maxwell  man,  to  remain  district 
attorney  in  Colfax  County  throughout  his  administration 
despite  strong  pressure  from  local  Democrats  to  appoint 
Sydney  Smith.  While  Mills  was  certainly  a  capable  attorney 

90.  Pamphlet:  Governor  Rosa'  Banquet  Speech  to  the  Aztec  Club  of  Albuquerque 
(July  22,  1885).  Copy  in  Henry  E.  Huntington  Library.  See  also  Albuquerque  Morning 
Journal,  July  23,  1885. 

91.  Albuquerque  Morning  Democrat,  September  21,  1887  ;  Deming  Headlight,  Sep- 
tember 23,  1887. 

Roy  Willoughby  has  asserted  that  open-range  ranching  in  New  Mexico  was  actually 
on  the  decline  by  1885.  See  his  The  Cattle  Range  Industry  in  New  Mexico.  Unpublished 
Master's  Thesis  (Department  of  History,  University  of  New  Mexico,  1933),  p.  89. 

92.  J.  E.  Curren  to  Ross,  November  29,  1885.  Ross  Papers. 

93.  Jesse  E.  Thompson  to  Ross,  December  8,  1885.  Ross  Papers. 


202  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

he  was  by  no  means  a  reformer.94  Ross  even  shied  away  from 
outright  support  of  any  one  newspaper  or  policy  for  the 
region.  It  is  very  probable  that  Ross  expected  the  Maxwell 
Company  to  get  its  just  deserts  in  the  outcome  of  the  trial 
pending  against  it  in  the  Supreme  Court  in  1887.  But  the 
surprise  decision  that  the  Company  had  a  right  to  its  ex- 
tended claims  put  an  end  to  any  such  hope.95  The  point  to  be 
made  is  that  while  Ross  was  a  reformer  who  wanted  to  im- 
pose free  soil  ideals  on  New  Mexico,  he  was  not  so  impulsive 
and  uncomplicated  as  Max  Frost  might  suggest  in  his  stereo- 
type. As  Ross  himself  had  said  to  Attorney  General  Garland, 
he  did  not  want  to  be  "hurried"  beyond  his  judgment. 
*  *  *  * 

By  1887  it  was  obvious  that  Ross  was  not  going  to  "re- 
form" New  Mexico  through  legislation,  or  by  way  of  a  faith- 
ful executive  set  of  officers.  Relying  upon  his  faith  in  public 
opinion  he  had  established  a  small  administration  paper,  the 
Santa  Fe  Weekly  Leader;  but  deprived  of  legislative  patron- 
age, it  quietly  succumbed.  He  negotiated  through  prominent 
Democrats  to  buy  the  Las  Vegas  Chronicle  and  later  the 
Optic,  but  these  efforts  also  failed.96  While  he  had  the  support 
of  J.  C.  Albright  in  the  Albuquerque  Morning  Democrat,  J.  E. 
Curren  in  the  Sierra  Grande  Press,  and  Singleton  M.  Ashen- 
f  elter,  editor  of  the  Southwest  Sentinel,  these  were  not  power- 
ful enough  to  turn  the  tide  of  hostile  opinion.  The  inchoate 
societies  of  the  Southwestern  mining  towns  and  the  recently 
arrived  farmers  whose  interests  Ross  defended  were  not  yet 
organized  in  such  a  way  that  they  could  be  a  force  in  Ross' 
favor.  Clearly  Montezuma's  restoration  was  at  an  impasse. 
How  could  he  find  his  way  to  go  ahead  ? 

Ross'  answer  was  similar  to  Johnson's  program  for  re- 
constructing the  South :  a  quick  and  easy  passage  to  state- 

94.  See  letter  Sn  behalf  of  French  in  "Letter  Received,  July,  1886"  ;  J.  C.  Holmes 
to  Ross,  Raton,  July  31,  1885;  and  O.  P.  McMains  to  Ross,  August   (n.d.),  1885  urging 
Mills'  removal.  Ross  Papers. 

95.  Dunham,  Government  Handout,  pp.  233-238,  also  the  Santa  Fe  New  Mexican, 
February  2.  1889. 

96.  Scattered  copies  of  the  Leader  are  in  the  Ross  Papers.  See  also  correspondence 
concerning  the  purchase  of  the  Gazette  and  Optic  in  "Letters  Received,  March  to  April, 
1886,"  Ross  Papers.  Delegate  Joseph  was  pessimistic  about  the  success  of  a  Democratic 
paper  in  Santa  Fe  and  refused  to  encourage  Ross  in  his  endeavors.  Joseph  to  Ross,  July 
23,  1886. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  203 

hood.  In  the  spring  of  1887  he  persuaded  the  amiable  Delegate 
Joseph  to  present  a  memorial  for  New  Mexico's  admission 
to  the  Union.  His  hopes  rose  further  when  Congress  consid- 
ered the  Springer  Omnibus  Bill  of  December  1887,  which  pro- 
posed that  the  Dakotas,  Montana  and  New  Mexico  be  ad- 
mitted together.  Writing  to  his  brother-in-law,  H.  C.  Bennett 
of  Silver  City,  he  urged  him  to  support  the  bill.  The  advan- 
tages of  statehood  were  so  great,  he  argued,  that  the  New 
Mexican  public  must  be  aroused  to  demand  admission.97  The 
failure  of  the  Springer  bill  did  not  dampen  Ross'  enthusiasm. 
Again  in  1888  Joseph  was  persuaded  to  introduce  a  statehood 
memorial,  and  Ross  himself  began  to  mention  the  outlines  of 
a  proposed  constitution  in  his  public  speeches.98  Even  after 
Cleveland  was  defeated  in  November,  1888,  and  it  was  obvious 
that  Ross'  term  as  governor  would  soon  end,  he  declared 
himself  in  favor  of  statehood  in  his  message  to  the  28th 
Assembly.99 

While  the  political  intrigues  surrounding  the  1889  con- 
stitutional convention  occurred  after  Ross  had  left  office,  and 
do  not  fall  within  the  purview  of  this  study,  it  is  proper  to 
note  that  despite  the  opposition  of  much  of  his  own  party — 
who  felt  that  the  Republican  legislature  had  unfairly  appor- 
tioned the  delegates  to  the  convention — Ross  appears  to  have 
worked  diligently  for  admission.  The  constitution  produced 
by  that  convention  was  so  conservative  and  "pro  land  grant," 
however,  that  in  disgust  he  joined  his  party  in  opposing  its 
ratification.  Ross  is  on  record  as  having  opposed  statehood 
when  in  actuality  he  opposed  only  the  constitution  pro- 
pounded by  the  statehood  forces  of  1889  and  1890.100 

Ross'  final  year  in  office  was  crowded  with  frustrating  dif- 
ficulties. The  election  of  a  new  legislature  was  accompanied  by 
evidence  of  such  blatant  frauds  at  the  polls  that  Ross  appealed 
to  Washington  for  legal  aid  to  prevent  the  defeated  candidates 

97.  Ross  to  H.  C.  Bennett,  Washington,  February  24,  1888. 

98.  See  "copy"  of  Joseph's  Memorial,  March  27,  1888,  in  Ross  Papers. 

99.  Edmund  G.  Ross,  General  and  Special  Messages  to  the  28th  Legislative  Assembly 
of  the  Territory  of  New  Mexico  ( Santa  Fe,  1889 ) ,  p.  iv  ;  Acts  of  the  Legislative  Assembly 
of  .  .  .  New  Mexico,  Twenty-Eighth  Session  (Santa  Fe,  1889),  Chapter  99,  pp.  235-240. 

100.  For  an  excellent  post-mortem  of  the  1889  vote  on  the  New  Mexico  Constitution, 
see  Ross'  broadside  public  letter  to  Congressman  C.  H.  Mansur,  January  5,  1890,  entitled 
"The  New  Mexico  Statehood  Proposition."  Ross  Papers. 


204  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

from  contesting  the  election  and  thus  hampering  the  legisla- 
ture. The  election  itself  had  been  climaxed  by  the  murder  of 
Dumas  Provencher,  a  homesteader,  who  was  shot  at  the  polls 
in  San  Rafael.  The  murder  was  a  political  one,  but  Ross'  ef- 
forts to  apprehend  the  killers  were  met  by  such  extraordinary 
evasiveness  on  the  part  of  both  parties  that  little  could  be 
done.101  As  he  read  the  conflicting  reports  he  was  faced  with 
a  new  Assembly  whose  Republican  members  seemed  deter- 
mined to  clear  those  suspected  of  committing  the  crime.  Un- 
doubtedly he  agreed  with  the  pessimistic  conclusion  of  Walter 
G.  Marmon,  an  old  friend  who  was  now  the  governor  of 
Laguna  Pueblo,  who  wrote  him  that  the  "present  legislature" 
was  no  improvement  on  the  one  of  two  years  before :  "personal 
likes  and  dislikes,  partisan  hate  and  ignorance  rule  the  actions 
of  its  members."102 

Still  undaunted,  Ross  sent  a  ringing  reform  message  to 
the  28th  Assembly.  He  proposed  abolition  of  the  antiquated 
and  unsatisfactory  financial  system  of  the  territory.  Unfair 
taxation,  speculation  in  territorial  warrants,  the  corrupt  of- 
fice of  county  assessor  and  non-taxation  of  land  grants  were 
his  particular  targets  of  criticism.  He  mad  his  usual  plea  for 
a  public  school  system  and  at  the  same  time  urged  the  estab- 
lishment of  an  insane  asylum.  In  conformity  with  his  home- 
steading  and  mining  program  for  New  Mexico,  he  urged  the 
creation  of  an  agricultural  college,  irrigation  development, 
the  settlement  of  land  titles,  and  a  geological  survey  for  the 
Territory.103 

Like  its  predecessor,  the  28th  Assembly  was  extremely 
hostile  to  Ross.  Now  that  enough  time  had  elapsed  so  that 
Ross  had  the  legal  right  to  appoint  new  territorial  officers, 
the  legislature  refused  to  confirm  most  of  his  choices,  full 
knowing  that  if  they  did,  these  Democratic  incumbents  could 
then  hold  office  for  two  years — just  as  Colonel  Breeden  had 

101.  Amado  Chavez  to  Ross,  San  Mateo,  November  10  and  28,  1888 ;  and  Walter  G. 
Marmon  to  Ross,  Laguna,  January  26,  1889.  Ross  Papers. 

102.  Marmon  to  Ross,  Ibid.  Marmon  was  a  surveyor  who  came  to  New  Mexico  to 
work  on  the  Navajo  Reservation  project.   He  remained  in  the  Territory  to  become  a 
teacher  and  trader  at  Laguna   Pueblo.   After  marrying  into  the  tribe  he  became  its 
governor  In  1886. 

103.  Edmund  G.  Ross,  General  and  Special  Messages  to  the  Twenty-Eighth  Legisla- 
tive Assembly  of  New  Mexico  (Santa  Fe,  1889). 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  205 

done.  Naturally  they  could  hinder  a  Republican  governor's 
program.  The  ends  to  which  the  legislature  was  willing  to  go 
to  prevent  Ross  from  making  any  appointments  can  be  seen 
in  the  Act  which  created  the  office  of  "Solicitor  General"  for 
the  Territory.  This  new  office  virtually  appropriated  all  the 
duties  of  the  Attorney  General,  but  was  not  to  be  filled  until 
October,  1889  (after  Ross  would  be  safely  out  of  office) .  Fur- 
ther, any  attempt  to  "impersonate"  the  Solicitor  General's 
duties  under  another  title  was  declared  a  "felony."  Thus  if 
Ross'  appointee  to  the  Attorney  General's  office  carried  out 
his  duties,  that  was  a  felonious  act.  At  the  same  time  he 
could  not  appoint  a  solicitor  general.  And  despite  his  veto, 
the  act  became  law.104 

In  his  relations  with  the  28th  Legislature,  both  Prince  and 
Twitchell  have  stressed  Ross'  lavish  use  of  the  veto  power. 

In  1889  there  were  in  all  145  laws  enacted.  Of  the  first  45, 
Governor  Ross  approved  26,  three  were  passed  over  his  veto, 
and  16  became  valid  "by  limitation".  The  relations  between  the 
governor  and  the  legislature  being  more  and  more  strained,  we 
find  that  of  the  last  100  laws  he  approved  only  21,  nine  being 
passed  over  vetoes  and  70  becoming  valid  without  action  by  the 
governor.105 

By  Prince's  interpretation,  Ross'  role  was  merely  that  of 
an  irate  negator.  They  fail  to  mention  that  a  Ross  supporter 
and  fellow  editor,  J.  A.  Kistler,  pushed  through  an  intelligent 
public  school  bill  only  to  have  it  defeated  at  the  last  moment 
by  Tom  Catron  in  a  complicated  maneuver  to  garner  Repub- 
lican support  for  a  constitutional  convention.106  Similarly, 
Pedro  Perea  is  given  credit  for  ending  the  vicious  speculation 
in  territorial  warrants  and  reforming  New  Mexico's  financial 
system,  when  it  was  Ross'  close  friend  and  fellow  Democrat, 
Henry  L.  Waldo,  who  drew  the  bill.  Similarly,  the  legislature 
did,  with  an  incredible  amount  of  log-rolling,  establish  an 
asylum,  a  university,  an  agricultural  and  a  mining  college, 

104.  Prince,  Concise  History,  PP.  205-206 ;  Twitchell,  II,  601. 

105.  Prince,  Concise  History,  Ibid. 

106.  Ross  himself  wrote  a  clear  account  of  the  defeat  of  the  Kistler  school  bill  in 
a  pamphlet  entitled:  Public  Schools  and  Statehood  for  New  Mexico   (March  31,  1890) 
which  was  actually  a  public  letter  to  Congressman  J.  S.  Struble.  Ross  Papers. 


206  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  passed  Ross'  wanted  call  for  a  constitutional  conven- 
tion.107 Ross'  administration  was  not  so  "barren  of  result"  as 
Prince  has  suggested.  Actually,  Ross  had  shown  the  need  for 
educational,  financial,  and  land  reform  which  the  legislature, 
hostile  or  not,  eventually  had  to  acknowledge.  It  is  indeed 
ironic  that  Governor  Prince's  administration  is  given  the 
credit  for  a  decent  public  education  law,  a  workable  financial 
system,  the  institution  of  the  Private  Court  of  Land  Claims, 
and  a  major  attempt  at  statehood.  While  Prince  did  secure 
these  things,  in  a  sense  he  merely  reaped  where  Ross  had 
sown. 

As  always  when  he  was  seeking  justice,  Ross  exposed  the 
Assembly's  failures  by  publishing  a  broadside  letter  to  New 
Mexico  at  large.  In  it  he  lamented  the  death  of  the  Kistler 
school  bill  which  he  called  a  "blunder  which  falls  but  little 
short  of  a  crime."  Determined  to  separate  the  sheep  from  the 
goats,  he  praised  his  old  enemy,  Colonel  Chavez,  for  having 
supported  the  bill.108  Ross'  suggested  remedy  was  the  same 
that  he  and  Burke  had  proposed  six  years  before :  a  federally 
imposed  system  of  education  for  the  territory.  In  a  prophetic 
warning  he  declared  that  without  public  education  New 
Mexico  would  never  be  admitted  to  the  Union.  A  dozen  years 
later  when  Albert  Beveridge  began  his  ten  year  crusade  to 
prevent  New  Mexico's  admission,  the  lack  of  schools  was  one 
of  his  most  telling  arguments.109  In  a  last-minute  appreciation 
of  Ross,  an  old  opponent,  the  editor  of  the  Deming  Headlight, 
praised  him  for  his  intelligent  and  courageous  stand  against 
the  Legislature.110 

There  is  no  doubt  that  many  of  Ross'  goals  were  idealistic 
and  impracticable  given  the  political  and  economic  conditions 
of  New  Mexico  in  the  late  1880's.  He  was  often  too  exacting 
and  blunt  in  dealing  with  men  who  had  lived  for  twenty  years 
or  more  on  legal  intricacies  and  clever  deals.  His  faith  in 
public  opinion  led  him  to  move  too  openly  and  to  depend  on 

107.  TwitcheU.  II.  601-502. 

108.  The  New  Mexico  Interpreter  (White  Oaks.  N.  Mex.).  March  8,  1889. 

109.  Ibid.   Ross   Public  Schools  and  Statehood;   see  also   Charles   E.   Maddox,   The 
Statehood  Policy  of  Albert  J.  Beveridge,  1906-1911.  Unpublished  Master's  Thesis  (Depart- 
ment of  History,  University  of  New  Mexico,  1947 ) . 

110.  Deming  Headlight,  March  8,  1889. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  207 

proclamation,  and  his  faith  in  automatic  regard  for  good 
service  was  perhaps  naive.  Just  as  he  was  about  to  be  relieved 
of  office,  he  appears  to  have  entertained  the  hope  that  his  old 
senatorial  friend,  Benjamin  Harrison,  would  keep  him  on  for 
a  time.  But  with  the  Santa  Fe  politicians  barking  at  his  heels, 
the  new  President  could  do  no  such  thing ;  and  L.  Bradford 
Prince  became  governor  in  Ross'  stead.111 

Ross  left  office,  unlike  most  New  Mexican  territorial  gov- 
ernors a  relatively  poor  man.  His  friend,  S.  M.  Ashenfelter, 
having  just  purchased  the  Deming  Headlight,  offered  him  a 
job  on  that  paper.  Ross  was  to  accept  the  position  a  year  later. 
Before  that  transpired  however,  Max  Frost,  Ross'  old  enemy 
came  forward  to  offer  him  a  job  on  the  Santa  Fe  New  Mexi- 
can! Twitchell,  the  New  Mexican  and  the  Ross  family,  all  say 
that  the  amazing  offer  was  accepted.112  Ross'  purpose  appears 
to  have  been  to  advance  the  cause  of  statehood,  of  which  Max 
Frost  was  now  the  leading  editorial  advocate  in  New  Mexico. 
By  this  strange  alliance,  each  man  paid  tribute  to  the  ability 
of  the  other  as  a  f  oeman  worthy  of  the  other's  steel.  But  it  was 
also  Ross'  tribute  to  the  power  of  the  press  which  had  so 
excoriated  him  during  his  four  years  in  office.  This  ill-fitted 
alliance  was  short-lived,  nevertheless,  and  by  1890  the  New 
Mexican  called  the  late  governor  "that  thick-skinned  bundle 
of  conceit  at  Deming."113  Relations  between  them  had  re- 
turned to  normal,  it  seems. 

Ross  spent  the  remainder  of  his  life  preoccupied  with  his 
dream  of  a  populous,  agricultural  New  Mexico.  Appropri- 
ately, he  became  the  Secretary  of  the  Territorial  Board  of 
Immigration,  and  a  writer  of  articles  in  behalf  of  irrigation. 
In  later  years,  he  turned  more  and  more  to  a  history  of  that 
great  moment  in  his  life:  Andrew  Johnson's  impeachment, 
which  he  wanted  to  treat  in  a  full  length  account.  Troubled 
by  failing  eyesight  and  poor  health,  he  nevertheless  managed 
to  publish  a  work  on  the  famous  trial  in  1896.  But  Ross  was 
dissatisfied  with  his  own  account  and  was  still  redrafting  a 

111.  Ross  left  office  April  2,  1889.  Pomeroy,  Territories  and  the  U.S.,  p.  110. 

112.  Twitchell,  II,  497n. ;  Leis,  "Memoirs  of  Ross"  ;  Santa  Fe  New  Mexican,  January 
8,  1890. 

113.  Ibid. 


208  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

manuscript  of  the  earlier  version  when  he  died  in  1907.114 

*     *     *     * 

One  may  ask :  what  is  the  significance  of  Ross  as  the  chief 
executive  of  New  Mexico?  He  was,  first  of  all,  a  transitional 
governor  who  realized  that  it  was  high  time  the  territory 
began  to  move  towards  economic  maturity  and  statehood  and 
away  from  an  economic  and  political  colonial  status.  Always 
advocating  railroads  and  mining  as  well  as  agriculture,  he 
laid  the  foundations — or  at  least  they  were  formed  while  he 
was  in  office — for  a  new  economy.  As  one  student  of  New 
Mexican  history  has  observed : 

The  time  between  1880  and  1900  may  be  called  the  begin- 
ning of  the  present  type  of  economy  in  New  Mexico  and  the  arid 
Southwest,  for  the  arrival  of  the  Santa  Fe  [Railroad]  heralded 
the  replacement  of  mercantile  capitalism  by  the  industrial  cap- 
italism still  present  today. .  . .  [An]  . . .  economic  theory  which 
appears  to  have  been  borne  out  in  New  Mexico  in  this  period  is 
that  as  a  region  progresses  from  an  underdeveloped  one,  the 
inequality  of  income  diminishes. 

Heath  estimates  that  in  the  period  1880  to  1900  property 
values  in  New  Mexico  increased  372.5  per  cent  with  no  popu- 
lation explosion  to  accompany  it.115  Whether  successful  or 
not,  Ross'  own  economic  program  was  designed  to  bring  about 
just  such  beneficial  changes  as  Heath  has  described. 

The  veteran  Kansas  Free  Soiler  also  had  the  faith  that  he 
could  remake  New  Mexico  just  as  he  and  his  friends  had 
"shaped"  Kansas  while  defeating  the  slavery  interests.  Ross, 
then,  was  a  creature  of  habit,  for  his  techniques  were  the 
familiar  ones  of  the  abolitionist  crusade  by  printed  word,  the 
"reconstruction"  of  society  (in  the  Radical  Republican  sense 
of  that  phrase)  by  land  reform,  and  finally  by  political  demo- 
cratization. He  also  had  faith  in  the  power  of  the  federal  gov- 
ernment to  do  anything  for  the  general  welfare.  To  these 
elements  he  added  a  belief  in  a  powerful  executive.  While  he 

114.  Leis,  "Memoirs  of  Ross."  See  also  Ross,  History  of  the  Impeachment  of  Andrew 
Johnson  .  .  .  for  High  Crimes  and  Misdemeanors  in  Office  ( Santa  Fe,  1896 ) . 

115.  Jim  Heath,  A  Study  of  the  Influence  of  the  Atchison,  Topeka  and  Santa  Fe 
Railroad  Upon  the  Economy  of  New  Mexico,  1878  to  1900.  Unpublished  Master's  Thesis 
(Department  of  Economics,  University  of  New  Mexico,  1955),  p.  5  and  p.  168. 


GOVERNOR  ROSS  209 

failed  to  reconstruct  this  second  territorial  home  in  the  fabled 
land  of  Montezuma,  a  perusal  of  the  records  would  indicate 
that  his  failure  was  due  not  so  much  to  the  stubbornness  and 
antagonizing-  qualities  as  it  was  to  a  weak  and  divided  Demo- 
cratic party,  an  able  and  sometimes  brilliant  opposition  by 
Republican  leaders,  and  too  great  haste. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  should  be  remembered  that  Ross  was 
not  exactly  a  voice  crying  in  the  wilderness.  While  he  was  in 
office  Congress  was  busy  using  radical  reconstruction  tech- 
niques in  Utah  in  order  to  end  polygamy  and  curb  the  power 
of  the  Mormon  Church.  In  Wyoming  Territory  Governor 
Thomas  Moonlight  was  defending  the  "nester"  against  the 
cattlemen,  and  behind  them  all  stood  a  reformist  Department 
of  Interior.  Just  as  he  was  leaving  office,  Ross'  heroes — the 
farmers — had  begun  to  form  alliances  in  the  Middle  West  and 
in  New  Mexico  itself  to  fight  for  reforms  of  their  own. 

On  the  local  level,  however,  Ross  retired  from  office  under 
conditions  similar  to  those  Andrew  Johnson  had  experienced 
during  his  last  year  in  the  White  House :  shorn  of  his  appoint- 
ment powers  by  tenure  of  office  acts  and  hampered  by  a  hostile 
legislature.  But  "Montezuma"  Ross  at  least  had  the  grim 
pleasure  of  knowing  that  he  had  given  the  political  and  eco- 
nomic old  guard  in  New  Mexico  an  "Indian  scare"  they  would 
not  soon  forget  and  would  some  day  appreciate.  In  the  entire 
history  of  American  territorial  government  after  the  Civil 
War  Ross  alone  appears  to  have  sought  to  make  the  tradi- 
tionally weak  position  of  governor  powerful — and  through 
that  medium  work  to  revamp  the  economic  and  political  struc- 
ture of  a  vast  region.  His  failure  was  not  nearly  so  significant 
as  his  dream. 


116.  For  evidence  of  the  Farmers'  Alliance  movement  in  New  Mexico  see  the  Raton 
Daily  Independent,  February  28,  1889.  (Bancroft.) 
[NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW,  Vol.  36,  No.  3.  July,  1961] 


THE  PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  PROBLEM  OF 
NEW  MEXICO  IN  THE  EIGHTEENTH  CENTURY* 

By  MAX  L.  MOORHEAD 

THE  Presidial  Company  of  Santa  Fe,  usually  numbering 
above  one  hundred  officers  and  men,  constituted  one  of 
the  most  remote  garrisons  on  New  Spain's  northern  frontier 
during  the  eighteenth  century.  Regular  troops  serving  there 
faced  not  only  the  ordinary  military  dangers  of  campaigning 
in  rugged  terrain  against  hostile  Indians  but  also  the  morale- 
shaking  economic  perils  of  indebtedness.  They  almost  never 
received  sufficient  income  to  cover  their  expenses.  The  prob- 
lem was  general  all  along  the  northern  frontier,  and  although 
it  was  never  satisfactorily  solved,  the  higher  authorities,  from 
the  King  down  to  the  Comandante  General,  fully  realized  the 
seriousness  of  the  situation  and  repeatedly  attacked  the  diffi- 
culties. Some  improvement  was  attained  before  the  close  of 
the  century,  but  most  of  the  reforms  that  were  instituted 
changed  procedures  rather  than  conditions. 

At  first  the  frontier  troops  were  paid  their  salaries  in 
cash  and  were  allowed  to  buy  their  provisions  and  equipment 
from  local  or  itinerant  merchants  as  best  they  could.  In  their 
remote  posts,  however,  they  were  soon  at  the  mercy  of  a  few 
tradesmen  whose  prices  were  under  little  if  any  official  re- 
straint. Unable  to  cover  these  mounting  costs  with  their  own 
fixed  pay,  the  soldiers  fell  into  a  steadily  increasing  debt. 
During  the  seventeenth  century  a  new  practice  was  developed 
wherein  the  purchase  of  provisions  was  centralized  in  the 
captains  of  the  presidial  companies.  It  was  supposed  that 
these  officers  could  bargain  with  the  merchants  more  effec- 
tively than  could  the  individual  soldiers.  Also  during  the 
seventeenth  century  half  of  the  salaries  of  these  troops,  and 
sometimes  the  entire  amount,  was  paid  in  provisions  rather 
than  cash.  Not  only  did  this  reduce  the  treasury's  risk  and 

*  This  study  was  made  possible  by  a  grant-in-aid  from  the  Faculty  Research  Com- 
mittee of  the  University  of  Oklahoma. 

Dr.  Moorhead  is  Professor  of  History,  University  of  Oklahoma,  Norman. 

210 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  211 

difficulty  in  transporting  specie  to  the  isolated  presidios  but 
it  also,  in  theory  at  least,  prevented  the  troops  from  over- 
spending for  their  needs.  In  practice  it  did  not.  The  company 
captains,  who  were  sometimes  also  the  provincial  governors, 
were  as  rapacious  as  the  merchants.  They  bought  the  provi- 
sions from  private  tradesmen  at  one  price  and  sold  them  to 
the  soldiers,  or  charged  them  against  their  salaries,  at  a 
much  higher  rate.  Thus,  while  these  officials  profited  enor- 
mously, the  troops  sank  even  more  deeply  in  debt.1 

In  New  Mexico,  the  Presidial  Company  of  Santa  Fe  had 
authorized  Captain  Felix  Martinez  and  a  local  merchant, 
Pedro  Otero,  to  purchase  its  provisions.  The  Marques  de 
Penuela,  who  was  at  once  governor  of  the  province  and  com- 
mandant of  the  presidio,  bought  a  large  consignment  of  goods 
in  collusion  with  Martinez  and  Otero  and  in  1712  offered  them 
to  the  troops  at  marked-up  prices.  By  withholding  the  salaries 
of  the  troops,  he  endeavored  to  make  them  sign  over  25,000 
pesos  of  their  pay  to  cover  the  cost  of  this  merchandise.2  As 
many  of  the  soldiers  were  already  in  debt  to  him,  Governor 
Penuela  also  forced  the  entire  garrison  to  sign  a  waiver  on 
their  salaries  of  ten  pesos  apiece.  This  was  to  cover  the  debts 
of  any  of  their  comrades  who  might  die  while  still  owing  him 
for  provisions.  Complaining  of  this  practice,  the  troops  peti- 
tioned Penuela' s  successor,  Juan  Ignacio  Flores  Mogollon,  to 
cancel  the  power  of  attorney  which  they  had  previously  given 
Captain  Martinez  and  Otero.  These,  they  charged,  had  failed 
to  comply  with  their  agreement  to  furnish  their  provisions 

1.  Well-documented   studies    demonstrating   the   abuses    in   the   provisioning:   of  the 
troops  in  northern  New  Spain  during  the  seventeenth  and  eighteenth  centuries  include 
the  following:  Francisco  R.  Almada   (ed. ),  Informe  de  Hugo  de  O'Conor  sobre  el  estado 
de  las  Provincial  Internas  del  Norte,  1771-1776    (Mexico,   1952)  ;  Carlos  E.  Castaneda 
et  aL,  Our  Catholic  Heritage  in  Texas,  1519-1936   (7  vols.,  Austin,  1936-1958)  ;  Charles 
E.  Chapman,  The  Founding  of  Spanish  California:  The  Northwestward  Expansion  of 
New  Spain,  1687-178S   (New  York,  1916)  ;  Charles  W.  Hackett   (ed.),  Historical  Docu- 
ments Relating  to  New  Mexico,  Nueva  Vizcaya,  and  Approaches  Thereto,  to  177S    (3 
vols.,  Washington,  1923-1937)  ;  Lawrence  Kinnaird  (ed.),  The  Frontiers  of  New  Spain: 
Nicolas  de  Lafora's  Description,  1766-1768   (Berkeley,  1959)  ;  Alfred  B.  Thomas    (ed.), 
After  Coronado:  Spanish  Exploration  Northeast  of  New  Mexico,  1690-1727    (Norman, 
1935)  ;   Thomas    (ed.),    Teodoro  de  Croix  and   the   Northern  Frontier  of  New  Spain, 
1776-178S  (Norman,  1941)  ;  and  Donald  E.  Worcester  (ed.),  Instructions  for  Governing 
the  Interior  Provinces  of  New  Spain,  1786,  by  Bernardo  de  Gdlvez  (Berkeley,  1951). 

2.  Soldiers  of  the  presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  petition  to  the  Cabildo,  August  1,   1712, 
Spanish  Archives  of  New  Mexico,  at  Santa  Fe  (Hereinafter  cited  as  SANM),  archive  177. 


212  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

at  cost.3  Later  the  same  year,  the  Viceroy  intervened  with  an 
order  prohibiting  the  governors  from  withholding  the  salaries 
of  the  troops,  applying  this  money  to  payment  of  their  debts, 
or  obligating  them  to  purchase  supplies  they  had  not  ordered.4 
Curiously,  the  garrison  at  Santa  Fe  petitioned  the  Viceroy 
not  to  apply  this  regulation  to  Governor  Flores  Mogoll6n 
because,  they  declared,  he  was  supplying  them  satisfactorily 
with  all  of  their  needs,  and  they  preferred  that  he  did  their 
buying  rather  than  Captain  Martinez  or  Otero.  According  to 
Captain  Martinez,  Governor  Flores  Mogollon  had  compelled 
the  troops  to  cancel  their  arrangement  with  him  and  Otero. 
but  the  troops  contended  they  had  done  so  of  their  own  free 
will.  They  had,  they  said,  suffered  considerable  arrears  from 
Martinez's  purchases.5  Reiterating  this  position  in  1715,  the 
troops  declared  that  Martinez's  allegations — that  the  troops 
had  been  under  duress  when  they  revoked  their  concession  to 
Martinez  and  Otero  and  that  they  had  suffered  no  indebted- 
ness while  they  and  Governor  Penuela  were  provisioning 
them — were  both  malicious  and  false.  They  maintained  that 
they  had  come  to  owe  Governor  Penuela  75,000  pesos  and 
Otero  18,664  pesos  under  that  arrangement  and  that,  after 
deductions  had  been  made  from  their  salaries,  they  still 
owed  the  former  44,000  pesos.6 

When  Captain  Martinez  became  governor  ad  interim  of 
New  Mexico  in  October  of  1715,  he  immediately  arrested 
Flores  Mogollon  and  accused  him  of  gross  mal-administration. 
While  these  charges  were  being  investigated,  Flores  Mogo- 
llon languished  in  prison  at  Mexico  City  for  more  than  two 
years.  According  to  Martinez,  Flores  Mogollon  had  not  only 
charged  the  soldiers  extravagant  prices  for  their  provisions 
but  had  also  attempted  to  sell  them  the  same  goods  they  had 
already  paid  for  with  deductions  from  their  salaries.7  Gov- 
ernor Martinez  himself  was  shortly  removed  from  office  for 

3.  Soldiers  of  the  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  petition  to  the  Governor  Juan  Ignacio  Flores 
Mogoll6n,  November  2.  1712,  SANM,  archive  183b. 

4.  Soldiers  of  the  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  representation  to  the  Viceroy,  July  IB,  1718, 
SANM,  archive  192a. 

B.  Ibid. 

6.  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  junta  proceedings.  May  27,  1715,  SANM,  archive  219. 

7.  Juan  de  Olivan  Revolledo   (Auditor  of  New  Spain)   to  the  Viceroy,  Mexico  City, 
September  22,  1723,  in  Thomas  (ed.),  After  Coronado,  189. 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  213 

similar  offenses.  Among  other  things  he  was  accused  of  own- 
ing a  mercantile  establishment  at  Santa  Fe  while  he  was  in 
office,  a  flagrant  violation  of  royal  law,  and  of  supplying  the 
troops  with  provisions  at  marked-up  prices  instead  of  at  cost, 
as  his  agreement  with  the  troops  required.  His  storekeeper 
was  Juan  Paez  Hurtado,  himself  a  former  governor.8 

Subsequently,  Martinez  charged  that  his  successor,  Gov- 
ernor Antonio  Valverde  y  Cossio,  profiteered  in  a  similar 
manner  and  that  he  withheld  the  salaries  of  the  troops  to 
cover  their  debts  for  provisions  which  he  furnished.9  Whether 
or  not  this  was  true,  the  officers  and  men  of  the  Santa  Fe 
garrison  praised  the  administration  of  Valverde.  When  he 
left  office  in  1722,  they  urged  the  Viceroy  to  instruct  his  suc- 
cessor, Juan  Domingo  de  Bustamente,  to  continue  Valverde's 
practice  of  discounting  from  their  annual  pay  fifty  pesos 
apiece  and  applying  this  toward  the  purchase  of  their  provi- 
sions. This,  they  declared,  prevented  them  from  going  further 
into  debt.10 

In  1724  when  the  Viceroy  commissioned  Brigadier  Pedro 
de  Rivera  to  inspect  the  presidios  of  the  northern  provinces, 
he  specifically  instructed  him  to  investigate  the  supply  prob- 
lem. Among  other  things  Rivera  was  directed  to  ascertain 
the  cost  of  transporting  provisions  to  each  of  the  garrisons, 
to  compare  the  prices  charged  the  troops  with  those  current 
in  nearby  towns,  and  to  prevent  the  captains  and  governors 
from  overcharging  the  soldiers  for  these  supplies.  This  last 
abuse  and  others  had  reportedly  been  committed  over  the 
past  twenty  years.11  Although  the  presidial  soldiers  were 
then  paid  an  average  of  450  pesos  a  year,  one  fourth  of  this 
amount  never  reached  them,  according  to  the  Viceroy,  for  the 
salaries  were  paid  in  goods,  and  the  captains,  in  connivance 
with  the  merchants,  had  been  charging  exhorbitant  prices  for 
these  provisions.12  The  major  result  of  Rivera's  inspection 

8.  Judgement  in  residencia  of  Governor  Felix  Martinez,  Santa  Fe,  August  16,  1723, 
SANM,  archive  322. 

9.  Martinez  to  the  Viceroy  [Mexico  City,  1720],  in  Thomas   (ed.),  After  Coronado, 
177-187. 

10.  Soldiers  of  the  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  petition  to  the  Viceroy,  March  15,  1722, 
SANM,  archive  315. 

11.  Castaneda,  Our  Catholic  Heritage,  II,  216-219. 

12.  Ibid.,  II,  211-214. 


214  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

and  report  was  the  adoption  of  a  new  presidial  code,  the  Reg- 
lamento  of  1729.  One  requirement  of  this  ordinance  was  that 
maximum-price  lists  be  posted  at  each  garrison  with  equitable 
rates  assigned  to  the  commodities  most  commonly  ordered 
by  the  troops.13 

The  price  ceilings  thus  established  seem  to  have  done  little 
to  protect  the  soldiers,  at  least  in  New  Mexico.  In  1760  a 
Franciscan  missionary  reported  that  the  presidials  at  Santa 
Fe  had  to  pay  150  pesos  a  year  for  clothing  of  the  poorest 
quality  and  another  250  pesos  for  other  provisions,  some  of 
which  they  had  not  ordered.  They  were  usually  charged 
double  the  current  price  for  local  produce:  S1/^  silver  pesos 
instead  of  2  for  a  fanega  of  corn,  4  for  wheat  instead  of  2,  8 
for  beans  instead  of  4,  and  so  on  with  meat,  chili,  and  the 
like.14  In  1760  and  again  in  1764  the  Viceroy  found  it  neces- 
sary to  convoke  juntas  at  Mexico  City  to  regulate  prices 
charged  the  presidials,  and  the  general  inspection  of  the 
northern  garrisons  made  by  the  Marques  de  Rubi  from  1766 
to  1768  produced  an  extensive  file  of  testimony  on  these  over- 
charges.15 The  main  source  of  discontent  among  the  troops, 
Rubi  reported,  was  that  they  were  paid  in  goods  instead  of 
in  cash.16 

As  a  result  of  these  findings,  the  Viceroy  ordered  in  1768 
that  the  presidials  be  paid  in  cash.  In  New  Mexico,  however, 
Governor  Pedro  Fermin  de  Mendinueta  appealed  for  exemp- 
tion from  this  requirement  on  the  ground  that  there  was  never 
sufficient  specie  in  his  province  to  meet  the  pay  roll,  and  this 
dispensation  was  granted  in  1769.17 

The  new  Reglamento  of  1772,  growing  out  of  Rubi's  in- 
spection and  report,  brought  about  a  major  reform  in  the 
presidio  supply  system.  Henceforth,  under  penalty  of  removal 
from  office  and  denial  of  further  employment  in  the  royal 
service,  the  presidial  captains  and  provincial  governors  were 

13.  Ibid.,  II,  220,  285. 

14.  Fray  Juan  Sanz  de  Lezaun,  "Account  of  the  Lamentable  Happenings  in  New 
Mexico,"  November  4,  1760,  in  Hackett    (ed. ),  Historical  Documents  Relating  to  New 
Mexico,  III,  468-479. 

15.  Chapman,  Founding  of  Spanish  California,  141-142. 

16.  Castaneda,  Our  Catholic  Heritage,  IV,  243. 

17.  Viceroy  Marques  de  Croix  to  Governor  Pedro  Fermin  de  Mendinueta,  Mexico 
City,  January  28,  1769,  SANM,  archive  644. 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  215 

to  cease  managing-  the  payment  of  the  troops'  salaries  and  the 
purchase  and  distribution  of  their  provisions.  These  func- 
tions were  now  vested  in  oficiales  habilitados,  non-commis- 
sioned officers  elected  by  the  officers  and  men  of  their  com- 
panies for  three-year  terms.  These  paymasters  were  em- 
powered to  buy  the  goods  ordered  by  the  troops  at  wholesale 
prices  and  to  distribute  them  at  this  cost  plus  only  2  per  cent, 
an  amount  considered  sufficient  to  cover  their  expenses.  After 
making  the  corresponding  deductions  for  these  purchases,  the 
retirement  pay,  and  rations,  the  paymasters  were  supposed 
to  pay  the  troops  the  balance  of  their  annual  salaries  in  cash, 
half  of  it  in  January  and  half  in  July.18 

Provisioning  the  troops  through  elected  paymasters  in- 
stead of  captains  or  governors  did  not  solve  the  problem.  The 
non-commissioned  officers  who  were  elected  were  often  ignor- 
ant of  accounting  procedures  and  lacking  in  purchasing  ex- 
perience. They  frequently  bought  the  provisions  at  artificially 
advanced  prices,  suffered  serious  losses  in  transporting  them 
to  the  presidios,  and,  through  either  dishonesty  or  incompe- 
tence, allowed  their  bookkeeping  records  to  become  hopelessly 
out  of  balance.  As  a  result,  one  bankruptcy  followed  another, 
leaving  the  troops  in  debt  and  short  of  food,  clothing,  and 
ammunition.19  Apparently  the  paymasters  were  unable  to  fill 
all  of  the  orders  of  the  troops,  for  some  soldiers  bought  direct- 
ly from  private  merchants  and  charged  the  purchases  against 
the  presidial  payroll.  In  1780  the  Comandante  General  at 
Chihuahua  decreed  that  henceforth  merchants  were  no  longer 
permitted  to  solicit  his  office  for  payment  of  debts  owed  by 
soldiers  who  had  purchased  goods  on  their  individual  credit. 
Compensation  in  such  transactions  would  be  made  only  when 
there  was  a  sufficient  balance  in  the  debtor's  individual  salary 
account.20 

Beginning  experimentally  in  1781  and  regularly  in  1783, 

18.  Comandante   Inspector   Hugo   de   O'Conor,    Informe,    1771-1776    (Almada,   ed. ), 
73-76  ;  Chapman,  Founding  of  Spanish  California,  142  ;  Castaneda,  Our  Catholic  Heritage, 
IV,  290-291. 

19.  Juan  de  Ugalde    (Governor  of  Coahuila)    to  Comandante  General  Teodoro  de 
Croix,  Hacienda  de  Sardinas,  March  12,  1782    (copy),  Archivo  General  y  Publico  de  la 
Nacion,  at  Mexico  City,  Provincias  Internas,  Vol.  13   (Hereinafter  cited  as  AGN,  Prov. 
Int.,  13),  folios  411-413;  Thomas  (ed.),  Teodoro  de  Croix,  13-14. 

20.  Teodoro  de  Croix,  bando,  Arispe,  May  1,  1780,  SANM,  archive  788. 


216  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

the  Comandante  General  abandoned  the  paymaster  system 
for  purchasing  provisions  and  let  regular  contracts  to  private 
merchants.  Each  of  these  was  assigned  to  one  or  two  presidios 
for  a  period  of  three  years.21  In  Nueva  Vizcaya  and  New 
Mexico,  while  the  presidial  paymasters  were  supposed  to  have 
charged  the  troops  2  per  cent  above  the  wholesale  prices  of 
the  provisions  at  Chihuahua,  the  new  merchant  contractors 
were  allowed  to  charge  the  higher  retail  prices  there.  Under 
this  arrangement  no  bankruptcies  occurred,  but  by  1786, 
when  the  contracts  were  about  to  expire,  it  was  evident  that 
the  salaries  of  the  troops  would  not  support  these  higher 
costs.22  The  Comandante  General  therefore  asked  the  con- 
tractors to  revise  their  rates  downward,  but  each  of  them 
complained  that  he  could  not  do  so  and  still  make  a  profit, 
and  some  said  they  were  already  losing  money.23  As  a  tempo- 
rary solution  to  the  problem,  the  Comandante  General  allowed 
the  contracts  to  lapse  and  reverted  to  the  paymaster  system 
to  tide  the  troops  over  the  next  year,  1787.  He  then  enter- 
tained bids  for  new  contracts  for  the  succeeding  years.24 

The  most  attractive  of  the  new  offers  came  from  Francisco 
de  Guizarnotegui,  a  member  of  the  mercantile  guild  of  Chi- 
huahua who  had  been  provisioning  the  presidio  of  Carrizal 
and  one  of  the  patrol  companies  of  Nueva  Vizcaya  under  one 
of  the  three-year  contracts  just  terminated.  Guizarnotegui 
offered  to  provision  all  seven  of  the  presidios  of  Nueva  Viz- 
caya, the  four  patrol  companies  of  that  province,  and  the 
presidio  of  New  Mexico  as  well  for  a  period  of  five  years  under 
certain  stipulated  conditions.25  The  other  merchants  of  the 
Chihuahua  guild,  acting  jointly,  countered  with  a  bid  of  their 
own,  but  after  revising  his  own  proposals  twice  to  meet  this 

21.  Ugalde  to  Croix,  March  12,   1782;  Francisco  Xavier  del  Campo    (Corregridor), 
deposition,  Chihuahua,  September  5,  1786,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fols.  411-413,  53-55. 

22.  Del  Campo,  deposition,   September   5,   1786 ;   Comandante  Inspector   Joseph   de 
Rengel  to  Comandante  General  Joaquin   Ugarte  y   Loyola,   Chihuahua,   November   11, 
1786;  Pedro  Galindo  Navarro  (Auditor  of  Provincias  Internas)   to  Ugarte,  Chihuahua, 
December  2,  1786,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fols.  53-55,  55-57,  57-59. 

23.  Del  Campo,  deposition,  September  5,  1786,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fols.  53-65. 

24.  Rengel  to  Ugarte,  Chihuahua,  October  3,  1786  ;  Ugarte  to  Viceroy  Bernardo  de 
Galvez,  Chihuahua,  October  12,  1786,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fols.  405-406,  402-404. 

25.  Francisco  de  Guizarnotegui,  propositions,  Chihuahua,   October  30,   1786,  AGN, 
Prov.  Int.,  13,  fols.  51-53. 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  217 

competition,26  Guizarnotegui  was  awarded  the  contract  on 
February  17, 1787. 

As  this  monopoly  arrangement  shortly  came  under  an 
investigation  which  yielded  a  large  file  of  documents  on  the 
whole  supply  problem,  it  is  now  possible  to  explore  the  subject 
in  some  depth.  The  contract  itself  was  composed  of  the  follow- 
ing ten  conditions : 

1)  For  a  period  of  five  years,  dating  from  January  1, 1788, 
the  contractor  would  fill  all  of  the  orders  of  the  presidios  and 
posts  of  Nueva  Vizcaya  and  New  Mexico  for  merchandise 
from  Vera  Cruz,  Puebla,  Jalapa,  Mexico  City,  and  Queretaro. 
He  would  charge  the  troops  the  original  cost  of  these  goods, 
the  purchasing  commission  of  4  per  cent  (which  was  custom- 
arily charged  by  buyers  at  Mexico  City) ,  the  freightage,  losses 
in  transit,  and  excise  taxes. 

2)  He  would  transport  this  merchandise  from  Mexico  City 
to  Chihuahua  at  the  old  freight  rate  of  16  reales  per  arroba 
(two  dollars  per  twenty-five  pounds) ,  which  was  4  reales  less 
than  the  rate  then  current. 

3)  He  would  also  transport  the  goods  from  Chihuahua  to 
the  individual  presidios  and  posts,  except  that  of  Santa  Fe,  at 
4  reales  per  arroba  below  the  current  rate.  The  New  Mexican 
garrison  would  receive  its  deliveries  at  Chihuahua,  as  had 
been  its  custom  in  the  past,  and  the  others  could  also  collect 
theirs  at  the  same  place  if  they  wished  to  employ  their  own 
mules  and  thus  save  on  the  freightage  cost  from  Chihuahua 
to  their  stations. 

4)  In  order  to  make  his  deliveries  on  schedule,  the  con- 
tractor would  have  to  receive  all  of  the  order  lists  of  the  com- 
panies at  the  beginning  of  each  year  and  with  the  endorse- 
ments of  the  Comandante  Inspector. 

5)  The  merchandise,  on  reaching  Chihuahua  and  before 
departing  for  the  presidios  and  posts,  would  have  to  be  in- 
spected by  the  contractor  and  the  Comandante  Inspector,  or 

26.  Cuerpo  de  Comercio,  propositions,  Chihuahua,  January  10,  1787 ;  Guizarnotegui, 
propositions,  Chihuahua,  January  27,  1787 ;  Cuerpo  de  Comercio,  propositions,  February 
3,  1787 ;  Guizarnotegui,  propositions,  February  7,  1787  ;  Cuerpo  de  Comercio,  waiver, 
February  14,  1787,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fols.  63-67,  73-75,  77-78,  90-94,  104. 


218  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

their  agents,  and  be  certified  by  them  as  having  met  the  speci- 
fications in  the  order  lists. 

6)  The  contractor  would  also  provide  produce  from  the 
province  of  Michoacan,  purchasing  this  at  Chihuahua  at  the 
lowest  prices  available  and  delivering  it  to  the  presidios  and 
posts  at  that  cost  plus  a  commission  of  2V&  per  cent. 

7)  He  would  deliver  the  Michoacan  goods  to  the  presidios 
and  posts  at  4  reales  per  arroba  less  than  the  current  freight 
rate  except,  as  indicated  in  the  3rd  condition,  that  New 
Mexico's  presidio  would  receive  its  orders  at  Chihuahua  and 
that  the  other  garrisons  could  receive  theirs  there  if  they  so 
desired. 

8)  In  order  to  make  his  purchases  in  time  for  the  sched- 
uled deliveries,  the  contractor  would  make  a  prudent  estimate 
from  the  order  lists  of  the  costs  of  the  goods,  commissions, 
excise  taxes,  and  freightage,  and  one  year  in  advance  of  his 
purchases  funds  in  the  amount  of  the  total  estimate  would  be 
delivered  to  him  by  the  royal  treasurer  at  Chihuahua  in  war- 
rants against  the  treasury  at  Mexico  City. 

9)  When  the  merchandise  was  purchased  and  delivered 
at  Chihuahua  accompanied  by  the  original  invoices,  the  excise 
tax  would  be  paid  at  the  customs  house  there,  and  the  total 
account  for  the  year  would  be  liquidated.  The  treasurer  at 
Chihuahua  would  then  pay  the  contractor  or  receive  from  him 
whatever  was  due  either  in  case  the  original  estimates  and 
actual  costs  did  not  balance.  The  treasurer  and  the  respective 
paymasters  would  then  discount  from  the  payroll  of  each 
presidial  and  patrol  company  the  amount  it  owed  for  the 
merchandise  received. 

10)  The  presidios  would  be  responsible  for  furnishing  the 
contractor's  mule  trains  with  competent  military  escort  on 
the  roads  to  and  from  their  stations — from  El  Pasaje  onward 
for  merchandise  purchased  in  Vera  Cruz,  Jalapa,  Puebla, 
Mexico  City,  and  Queretaro  and  from  Chihuahua  onward  for 
the  goods  of  Michoacan.  The  contractor  would  request  these 
escorts  fifteen  or  twenty  days  in  advance,  and  they  would  be 
provided  without  delay  so  as  to  avoid  the  expense  of  detain- 
ing the  trains.  If  the  contractor  should  be  unable  to  make  all 
of  the  deliveries  beyond  El  Pasaje  in  a  single  trip,  escorts 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  219 

would  be  furnished  for  as  many  as  two  others.27 

From  almost  the  very  beginning  Guizarnotegui's  opera- 
tions in  provisioning  the  presidios  were  embarassed  by  official 
intervention  and  financial  difficulties.  Before  the  contractor 
was  able  to  cash  the  warrants  issued  for  his  purchases,  pay- 
ment on  them  was  suspended  by  the  royal  treasury  at  Mexico 
City,  and  the  entire  contract  was  held  in  abeyance  pending 
the  result  of  a  full-scale  investigation.  The  Comandante  Gen- 
eral, it  developed,  had  failed  to  go  through  proper  channels 
in  letting  it.  During  the  previous  year  the  King  had  reformed 
the  administrative  system  for  his  realms,  and  under  this  new 
order  such  military  and  treasury  matters  as  the  provisioning 
of  the  troops  were  supposedly  under  the  jurisdiction  of  new 
officials  known  as  intendants.  The  Intendant  of  Durango 
should  have  been  consulted  before  Guizarnotegui's  contract 
was  approved.  Eventually  the  contract  was  approved,  by  the 
Viceroy  on  September  10,  1788,  and  by  the  King  on  June  8, 
1789,  but  it  was  not  until  September  of  the  latter  year  that 
Guizarnotegui  was  assured  that  treasury  funds  would  be 
issued  for  his  purchases.28 

Meanwhile,  for  two  and  a  half  years,  Guizarnotegui  oper- 
ated without  either  a  valid  contract  or  adequate  funds  and 
had  to  purchase  the  provisions  for  the  troops  on  his  own 
credit.  In  so  doing  he  had  to  pay  the  wholesale  merchants  at 
Mexico  City  a  premium  of  9  per  cent  for  credit  extended  to 
January,  when  the  troops  were  paid,  and  an  additional  5  per 
cent  for  what  was  still  due  thereafter.  Being  unwilling  to 
absorb  this  loss  himself,  Guizarnotegui  merely  added  it  to  the 
total  bill  against  the  troops.29  The  Comandante  General  ap- 
proved this  procedure  for  the  deliveries  of  the  first  year,  1788, 
but  he  instructed  Guizarnotegui  that  thereafter  when  funds 
were  not  delivered  to  him  in  advance,  he  should  obtain  his 
credit  at  5  per  cent  interest  by  guaranteeing  the  salaries  of 
the  troops  as  his  security.  This  Guizarn6tegui  did  not  do  be- 

27.  Contract  with  Guizarnotegui,  Chihuahua,  February  17,  1787,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13, 
fob.  106-111. 

28.  Viceroy  Manuel  Antonio  Flores  to  Ugarte,   Mexico  City,   September  10,   1788 ; 
Royal  order,  Aranjuez,  June  8,  1789  ;  Flores  to  Ugarte,  Mexico  City,  September  20,  1789  ; 
AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fols.  166-167,  203,  204-205.  The  documentation  on  the  jurisdictional 
dispute  appears  in  folios  1-207. 

29.  Guizarnotegui  to  the  Viceroy,  Mexico  City,  April  16,  1789,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  18, 
fols.  181-182. 


220  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

cause,  as  he  said,  the  merchants  at  Mexico  City,  knowing  his 
contract  still  lacked  official  approval,  questioned  the  validity 
of  such  a  guarantee.30  He  therefore  continued  to  pay  9  per 
cent  for  the  first  year  of  his  credit  and  an  additional  5  per  cent 
for  extension  beyond  that  term  and  also  to  charge  this  inter- 
est to  the  account  of  the  troops.31 

For  the  provisions  of  the  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe  for  the  first 
year,  1788,  delivered  to  its  paymaster  at  Chihuahua  in  Febru- 
ary,32 Guizarnotegui  presented  a  bill  for  17,655  pesos  and  6!/2 
reales  and  received  from  the  paymaster  13,648  pesos.  This  left 
a  balance  due  of  4,007  pesos  and  6  1/2  reales  plus  an  interest  of 
5  per  cent  for  the  extension  of  credit  amounting  to  200  pesos 
and  3  reales.  According  to  Guizarnotegui's  accounting,  there- 
fore, the  presidio  still  owed  him  4,208  pesos  and  IVa  reales: 


Cost  of  merchandise  purchased  in  Jalapa,  Puebla, 

Mexico  City,  and  Queretaro  ................     13,357  pesos,  2%  reales 

Purchasing  commission  (4%)  ....          534      "       2%      " 

Premium  for  credit  for 

one  year  (9%)  ......................       1,202      "       Itt      " 

Freightage  (437  arrobas  and  21% 
pounds  at  18  reales 
per  arroba)  ............................          985      "       1 

Cost  of  merchandise  from  Michoacan 

purchased  at  Chihuahua  ..............       1,576      "       7%      " 


Total  17,655     "       6% 

Less  payment  on  account, 

February  19,  1788, 13,648 


Balance  due 4,007      "       6% 

Premium  for  extended  credit  (5%)  ..         200      "      3 


Balance  due  January  1,  1789 4,208  1% 

Since  the  amount  paid  in  February  was  well  over  the  price 
of  the  goods  from  Jalapa,  Puebla,  Mexico  City  and  Queretaro 
(13,357  pesos) ,  and  since  this  merchandise  was  purchased  on 

30.  Jus  to    Pastor    de    Madariaga    (Gui/.arnoteKui's    agent)    to    Ugarte,    Chihuahua, 
[July,  1789],  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13  fob.  245-269. 

31.  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  account  against  Guizarnotegui  for  supplies  furnished  in 
1788,  1789,  and  1790,  Santa  Fe.  July  8,  1790,  SANM,  archive  1084a. 

32.  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  resume  of  invoice  received  from  Guizarn6tegui  on  Febru- 
ary 19,  1788,  in  ibid. 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  221 

credit  in  October  of  1787,  the  interest  of  9  per  cent  should  not 
have  run  for  an  entire  year  but  only  for  four  months,  until 
February,  when  the  paymaster  received  the  goods  and  paid 
the  contractor.  Therefore,  when  the  Presidial  Company  of 
Santa  Fe  audited  the  account,  it  claimed  a  reduction  of  801 
pesos  and  2  5/6  reales  from  the  bill,  as  interest  unjustly 
charged  for  two-thirds  of  a  year.  By  the  same  token,  it 
claimed  an  additional  40  pesos  and  */2  real  as  the  correspond- 
ing overcharge  for  interest  on  the  amount  due  after  the  first 
of  the  year.  Moreover,  since  the  contract  stipulated  a  freight 
rate  of  16  reales  per  arroba  and  Guizarnotegui  had  charged 
18  reales,  the  presidio  claimed  an  overcharge  of  109  pesos  and 
3%  reales  on  this  item.  And  finally,  Guizarnotegui  had 
charged  the  troops  500  pesos  for  5,000  loaves  of  brown  sugar 
from  Michoacan,  at  the  rate  of  ten  loaves  to  the  peso,  while 
on  the  same  occasion  he  had  sold  the  same  commodity  to  Jose 
Ortiz,  a  merchant  of  Santa  Fe,  at  the  rate  of  18  to  the  peso. 
Therefore,  the  presidio  claimed,  a  further  reduction  from  its 
bill  of  222  pesos  and  2  reales  was  in  order.  Altogether  its 
claims  against  Guizarnotegui's  bill  for  the  year  amounted  to 
1,173  pesos  and  1  Vi2  reales.33 

For  the  second  year,  1789,  Guizarnotegui  presented  the 
New  Mexican  garrison  with  a  higher  and  even  more  question- 
able bill:34 

Cost  of  merchandise  purchased  in  Jalapa,  Puebla, 

Mexico  City,  and  Queretaro 14,166  pesos,  3%  reales 

Purchasing  commission  (4%)  ....          566      "       5          " 
Premium  for  credit  for 

one  year  (9%)  1,325     "       7%      " 

Freightage  (547  arrobas  and  11 
pounds  at  16  reales 
per  arroba)  1,094     "       7         " 


17,153  pesos,  6%  reales 
Cost  of  merchandise  from  Michoacan 

purchased  at  Chihuahua 1,737      "       6%      " 


Total  18,891  pesos,  5%  reales 


33.  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  notations  to  same,  in  ibid. 

34.  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  resume  of  invoice  received  from  Guizarnotegui  on  February 
3,  1789,  in  ibid. 


222  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

When  these  deliveries  were  made  at  Chihuahua  in  Febru- 
ary, 1789,  the  paymaster  of  Santa  Fe  provided  reimburse- 
ment in  the  amount  of  16,300  pesos  and  2%  real,  leaving  a 
balance  of  2,591  pesos  and  2%  reales  due.  The  paymaster 
then  made  out  a  promissory  note  to  Guizarn6tegui  for  2,656 
pesos  and  %  real  to  cover  this  and  the  interest  due  on  the 
balance.33 

After  auditing  this  bill  the  Santa  Fe  company  took  sev- 
eral exceptions  to  it.  The  premium  of  9  per  cent  for  credit  had 
been  charged  not  only  on  the  original  cost  of  the  goods  in  the 
interior  cities  but  also  on  the  purchasing  commission  as  well, 
which  had  not  been  the  case  in  the  bill  of  the  previous  year. 
The  presidio  thus  claimed  47  pesos  and  3  reales  for  the  over- 
charge. Further,  as  in  the  previous  bill,  this  interest  was 
charged  for  an  entire  year  whereas  the  purchases  had  been 
made  on  October  31,  1788,  and  the  reimbursement  on  Febru- 
ary 3, 1789.  Therein  lay  an  overcharge  of  949  pesos  and  1  7/i2 
real.  Likewise  the  interest  on  what  was  still  due  should  have 
been  reduced  by  47  pesos  and  4  reales.  Finally,  in  comparing 
the  prices  Guizarnotegui  charged  the  presidio  for  Michoacan 
goods  with  what  he  had  charged  Ortiz  and  another  merchant 
of  Santa  Fe,  Jose  Rafael  Sarracino,  the  troops  claimed  an- 
other 234  pesos  and  73^  reales.  In  all,  these  claims  for  the 
year  amounted  to  1,279  pesos  and  Vs  real.36 

For  1790,  the  third  year  of  the  contract,  Guizarnotegui's 
bill,  for  some  reason,  did  not  include  freightage  on  the  mer- 
chandise purchased  in  the  interior  or  the  cost  of  the  goods 
from  Michoacan  :37 

Cost  of  merchandise  purchased  in  Jalapa,  Puebla, 

Mexico  City,  and  Queretaro 13,010  pesos,  2V2  reales 

Purchasing  commission  (4%)  ....          520      "       3%      " 


13,630      "       5% 
Less  amount  issued  in  advance 

of  purchases 5,943      "      4% 


Balance  due 7,587 


35.  Ibid. 

86.  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  notations  to  same,  in  ibid. 

37.  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  resume  of  invoice  received  from  Guizarnotegui  on  February 
10,  1790,  in  ibid. 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  223 

Premium  for  credit  for 

one  year  (9%)  682      "       6V2      " 


Total  8,269  pesos,  7%  reales 

The  bill  for  the  Michoacan  goods  was  apparently  made  out 
separately,  but  when  Guizarnotegui  presented  the  above  at 
Chihuahua,  he  received  5,171  pesos  and  7^  reales,  leaving  a 
balance  due  on  January  1,  1791,  of  3,098  pesos  and  y%  real. 
To  this  was  to  be  added  154  pesos  and  71/£  reales  as  the  5  per 
cent  interest  for  the  extension  of  credit  on  the  new  balance. 

Once  again  the  presidio  challenged  Guizarnotegui's  charge 
of  9  per  cent  interest  on  the  purchasing  commission  in  addi- 
tion to  the  original  cost  of  the  goods,  claiming  for  this  item  a 
reduction  of  46  pesos  and  6  2/3  reales.  And  again  it  sought 
to  reduce  the  period  of  this  interest  from  a  full  year  to  less 
than  four  months,  since  the  credit  ran  only  from  October  14, 
1789,  to  February  10, 1790.  For  this  latter  the  claim  amounted 
to  242  pesos  and  %  real,  and  for  the  corresponding  over- 
charge on  the  5  per  cent  premium,  12  pesos  and  5/6  real.  The 
presidio  also  challenged  the  purchasing  commission  for  goods 
bought  at  Puebla,  since  this  was  covered  by  that  paid  in  Mex- 
ico City,  and  also  the  freightage  from  Puebla  to  Mexico  City, 
which  had  not  been  charged  in  previous  years.  These  claims 
amounted  to  134  pesos  and  5%  reales.  A  comparison  of  Guiz- 
arnotegui's prices  on  worsted  goods  bought  at  Queretaro  and 
blankets  at  Puebla  justified  a  further  claim  of  148  pesos  and 
3l/2  reales.  The  total  amount  of  the  bill  for  Michoacan  goods 
does  not  appear  either  in  this  billing  or  in  the  presidio's 
claims,  but  the  latter,  by  comparing  Guizarnotegui's  prices 
with  those  at  which  the  Chihuahua  merchants  Francisco 
Elguea  and  Savino  de  la  Pedrueza  sold  them  to  Ortiz  and 
Sarracino  of  Santa  Fe,  itemized  overcharges  totaling  59 
pesos  and  4%  reales  for  brown  sugar  loaves  and  soap  from 
that  province.  Thus,  for  1790  the  claims  amounted  to  643 
pesos  and  5%  reales.38 

The  total  claims  for  the  three  years,  which  the  presidio 
filed  against  Guizarnotegui  on  July  8, 1790,  amounted  to  3,095 

38.  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  notations  to  same,  in  ibid. 


224  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

pesos  and  7  1/6  reales,  or  approximately  6  per  cent  of  the 
total  bill  for  that  period.  Nor  was  this  the  full  extent  of  the 
contractor's  grief.  There  were  the  claims  of  the  seven  presi- 
dios and  four  patrol  posts  of  Nueva  Vizcaya.  And  even  before 
the  garrisons  audited  their  bills,  the  Comandante  Inspector 
and  his  agents  at  Chihuahua  were  scrutinizing  Guizarnote- 
gui's  deliveries. 

Only  minor  adjustments  had  to  be  made  in  the  deliveries 
of  1788,  but  in  the  following  year  complications  set  in.  Guiz- 
arnotegui's  mule  trains  from  the  interior  arrived  at  Chi- 
huahua just  as  the  military  escorts  from  Carrizal,  San  Eliz- 
eario,  and  Santa  Fe  were  preparing  to  return  to  their  posts. 
This  left  no  time  for  an  inspection  of  the  goods  at  Chihuahua 
for  those  presidios  and  so  these  packages  were  not  opened 
or  properly  inspected  until  they  were  out  of  the  contractor's 
hands  and  beyond  the  scrutiny  of  the  Comandante  Inspector's 
agents.39  The  best  the  Comandante  General  could  do  was  to 
call  upon  the  paymasters  of  these  three  presidios  to  send  back 
to  Chihuahua  at  a  later  date  samples  of  the  goods  thus  re- 
ceived. On  the  basis  of  these  samples  the  quality,  quantity,  and 
pricing  of  the  original  deliveries  were  then  reviewed  by  three 
merchants:  one  representing  the  interests  of  the  presidios, 
one  those  of  the  contractor,  and  the  third  acting  as  referee 
when  disputes  arose.40  Guizarnotegui  complained  that  it  was 
improper  to  judge  the  yardage  goods  he  had  delivered  from 
remnants  submitted  by  the  presidios,  for  there  was  no  guar- 
antee that  they  were  taken  from  the  material  actually  deliv- 
ered and  also  because  a  remnant  of  a  piece  of  dry  goods  might 
be  cut  from  the  end  of  a  bolt  and  thus  be  inferior  in  quality  to 
the  whole  piece.41  Nevertheless,  the  inspection  continued 
under  these  circumstances.  Samples  of  Guizarnotegui's  deliv- 
eries were  compared  with  similar  merchandise  in  the  shops 
at  Chihuahua,  and  the  corresponding  invoices  were  checked 
for  price  variation.  In  some  instances  the  goods  delivered  by 
Guizarnotegui  could  not  be  matched  with  those  in  the  local 

88.  Ayudante  Inspector  Diego  de  Borica  to  Ugarte,  Chihuahua,  February  17,  1789, 
AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fol.  212. 

40.  Ugarte,  decree,  Chihuahua,  May  18,  1789,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  18,  fob.  234-235. 

41.  Guizarnotegui   to  Borica   [Mexico  City,   January,    1790],   AGN,   Prov.   Int.,   18, 
fol.  307. 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  225 

shops,  but  where  comparisons  were  possible,  it  was  found  that 
Guizarnotegui  had  overcharged  the  troops  on  twenty  cate- 
gories of  yardage  goods.42 

Of  greater  concern  was  the  matter  of  the  9  per  cent  pre- 
mium which  Guizarnotegui  had  added  to  the  bill  to  cover  the 
purchases  he  had  to  make  on  credit.  Although  he  had  no 
authorization  from  his  contract  to  charge  the  troops  for  this 
credit,  Guizarnotegui  was  hardly  liable  for  this  burden 
himself,  for  it  had  arisen  only  from  the  failure  of  the  treasury 
officers  to  fulfill  their  obligation  to  supply  him  with  adequate 
funds  a  full  year  in  advance  of  his  scheduled  deliveries.  Since 
both  parties  had  failed  to  comply  strictly  with  their  contrac- 
tual obligations,  and  since  the  contract  itself  was  not  legally 
binding  until  September,  1789,  the  whole  question  of  this 
liability  was  left  to  the  decision  of  the  Comandante  General. 
Finally  on  April  7, 1790,  a  ruling  was  handed  down  from  that 
quarter : 

Guizarnotegui  would  be  compensated  for  the  premium  of 
9  per  cent  only  for  the  purchases  he  made  on  credit  between 
July  1  and  December  31,  1787;  that  is,  for  the  merchandise 
he  delivered  early  in  1788.  For  his  purchases  between  January 
1,  1788,  and  December  31,  1789,  which  were  delivered  early 
in  1789  and  1790,  he  was  entitled  to  only  5  per  cent  for  his 
credit.  And  for  1791  and  1792,  the  remaining  two  years  of  his 
contract  (now  that  it  was  fully  in  force) ,  he  was  prohibited 
from  charging  any  interest  at  all,  even  when  funds  were  not 
supplied  a  full  year  in  advance,  as  long  as  he  should  receive 
this  money  in  ample  time  to  make  his  deliveries  on  schedule. 
This,  the  Comandante  General  declared,  was  the  true  spirit 
of  the  8th  condition  of  the  contract.  As  for  the  claims  against 
Guizarnotegui  in  the  liquidation  of  his  accounts  for  the  first 
three  years  of  the  contract,  these  would  be  determined  by  the 
merchants  already  appointed  by  himself  and  the  Comandante 
Inspector  as  agents  and  referee.43 

At  this  point,  April  7, 1790,  the  file  of  documents  accumu- 
lated during  the  investigation  ends.  There  is  nothing  there  of 

42.  Diego  de   Borica,   Joseph   Antonio   de   Iribarren    (representing   Guizarnotegui), 
and  Manuel  Ruiz    (representing  the  troops),  Estado  de  Precios,  Chihuahua,  March   17, 
1790,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fol.  319. 

43.  Ugarte,  decree,  Chihuahua,  April  7,  1790,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fol.  380. 


226  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

later  date  to  indicate  how  this  ruling  affected  Guizarnotegui. 
However,  from  the  presidial  records  at  Santa  Fe,  it  is  appar- 
ent that  Guizarnotegui  did  not  continue  as  the  contractor  for 
the  remainder  of  his  five-year  term.  In  acknowledging  receipt 
of  the  New  Mexican  presidio's  claims  against  Guizarn6tegui 
for  the  first  three  years,  the  Comandante  General  in  July, 
1790,  referred  to  him  as  the  "former  contractor."44  Then, 
three  months  later,  he  distributed  to  the  presidios  copies  of 
a  new  contract  which  had  just  been  drawn  up  at  Chihuahua.45 
In  this  new  arrangement  not  one  but  nine  merchants,  all 
members  of  the  mercantile  guild  of  Chihuahua,  undertook  to 
supply  the  presidios  for  the  single  year  1791.  The  stipulations 
of  this  were  so  much  less  generous  to  the  troops  than  those  in 
Guizarnotegui's  contract  that  it  might  well  be  presumed  that 
the  former  contractor  had  cancelled  his  service  on  his  own 
free  will  and  that  the  Comandante  General  had  been  forced 
to  seek  other,  less  advantageous,  arrangements  because  of  the 
press  of  time.  At  any  rate  the  contract  for  1791  provided  that 
the  nine  merchants  would  supply  the  troops  with  whatever 
merchandise  of  prime  necessity  from  Castile,  Puebla,  Mexico 
City,  and  Queretaro  that  they  carried  in  their  stores;  that 
they  would  furnish  these  at  original  cost  plus  6  per  cent ;  that 
the  troops  had  to  assume  the  9  per  cent  premium  whenever 
purchases  had  to  be  made  on  credit,  the  4  per  cent  commission 
charged  by  purchasing  agents  at  Mexico  City,  the  excise 
taxes,  and  the  packing  expenses ;  that  the  merchants  would 
bear  the  losses  incurred  in  transit,  but  that  the  troops  would 
have  to  provide  escorts  for  the  trains  from  the  interior  beyond 
El  Pasaje  and  as  far  as  Chihuahua;  that  the  contractors 
would  supply  the  troops  with  the  produce  of  Michoacan  at  8 
per  cent  above  what  they  had  to  pay  for  it  at  Chihuahua ;  that 
the  troops  would  have  to  furnish  the  contractors  with  pur- 
chasing funds  in  warrants  issued  at  Chihuahua  and  cashable 
at  Mexico  City ;  and  that  the  deliveries  of  the  provisions  to 

44.  Governor  Fernando  de  la  Concha  to  Ugarte,  Santa  Fe,  July  12,  1790 ;  Coman- 
dante General  Pedro  de  Nava  to  De  la  Concha,  Chihuahua,  July  26,  1790,  SANM,  archives 
1085a,  1137. 

45.  Contract   with    Pedro   Ramos    de   Verea,    Joseph    Antonio   de   Iribarren,    Diego 
Ventura  Marquez,  Ventura  Do-Porto,  Savino  Diego  de  la  Pedruesa,  Francisco  Manuel 
de  Elguea,   Andres  Manuel  Martinez,   Pablo  de  Ochoa,   and  Pedro  Yrigoyen    (certified 
copy),  Chihuahua.  Ortober  18.  1790,  SANM,  archive  1120. 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  227 

the  paymasters  would  be  made  at  Chihuahua  rather  than  at 
the  individual  presidios.46 

The  records  of  the  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe  do  not  indicate 
how  this  arrangement  worked  out  for  the  year  1791  or  how 
the  garrison  was  provisioned  thereafter.  Some  conclusions 
on  the  presidio  supply  problem  in  general,  however,  can  be 
drawn  from  the  rather  full  records  of  the  investigation  of 
Guizarnotegui's  contract  and  its  antecedents. 

In  the  first  place,  it  is  abundantly  evident  that  the  authori- 
ties were  sincerely  concerned  with  the  welfare  of  the  presidial 
soldiers  during  the  eighteenth  century,  and  that  it  was  with 
their  interests  in  mind  rather  than  with  those  of  the  royal 
treasury  or  of  the  economy  of  the  provinces  that  the  supply 
system  was  reformed  several  times.  After  centralizing  all 
purchases  in  the  presidial  captains  and  provincial  governors, 
the  higher  authorities  established  price-ceilings  on  the  pro- 
visions, through  the  Reglamento  of  1729.  When  this  measure 
failed  to  provision  the  troops  adequately,  fairly,  and  econom- 
ically, they  promulgated  the  Reglamento  of  1772,  which 
turned  the  purchases  over  to  elected  paymasters.  Then,  as 
these  non-commissioned  officers  failed  to  provide  goods 
cheaply  enough  for  the  troops  without  incurring  bankruptcy, 
the  government,  beginning  in  1781,  let  contracts  to  private 
merchants,  each  supplying  one  or  two  presidios.  These  con- 
tracts failed  to  satisfy  either  the  troops  or  the  merchants 
themselves,  and  so  after  reverting  to  the  paymaster  system 
for  one  year,  1787,  the  authorities  let  a  monopoly  contract  for 
the  several  presidios  and  posts  of  Nueva  Vizcaya  and  New 
Mexico  to  a  single  merchant  for  the  years  1788  through  1792. 
This  arrangement  also  proved  unsatisfactory  to  both  parties, 
and  in  1790,  as  we  have  seen,  it  was  terminated,  and  a  new 
monopoly  was  let  for  1791  to  a  group  of  nine  merchants. 
Each  of  these  reforms  was  a  conscientious  attack  on  the  prob- 
lem even  though  all  seem  to  have  failed  somewhat  in  their 
ultimate  purpose. 

The  Guizarnotegui  contract  broke  down  for  a  number  of 
reasons.  First,  owing  to  a  purely  jurisdictional  dispute,  the 
contract  was  not  fully  in  force  for  the  first  two  and  a  half 

46.  Ibid. 


228  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

years.  Second,  because  of  this,  the  eighth  condition  of  the 
contract  (guaranteeing  the  contractor  adequate  purchasing 
funds  a  year  in  advance) ,  was  not  fulfilled.  Third,  as  the  con- 
tractor was  forced  to  purchase  on  credit,  a  dispute  arose  over 
interest  rates.  Finally,  the  Comandante  General's  ruling  on 
this  question  and  on  the  advancement  of  funds  was  a  viola- 
tion of  the  letter,  if  not  the  spirit,  of  the  contract.  The  con- 
tractor himself  was  not  blameless  in  this  controversy,  how- 
ever, for  his  invoices  for  Santa  Fe's  presidio  show  not  only 
shoddy  accounting  but  also  apparent  intent  to  defraud.  Not 
only  did  Guizarnotegui  attempt  to  charge  interest  for  an 
entire  year  when  he  was  reimbursed  after  only  four  months, 
but  he  also  attempted  to  charge  it  on  his  purchasing  commis- 
sion as  well  as  on  the  cost  of  the  purchases  themselves.  Some 
of  his  prices  were  out  of  line  with  those  current  at  the  same 
place  and  time,  and  this  was  especially  true  of  the  produce  of 
Michoacan.  According  to  his  contract,  he  was  supposed  to 
purchase  these  goods  at  Chihuahua  at  the  lowest  prices  avail- 
able. In  fact,  however,  he  bought  a  large  number  of  these 
items  from  his  own  store  there  and  at  prices  well  above  what 
other  local  merchants  were  charging.47 

Another  significant  conclusion  may  be  drawn  from  analyz- 
ing Guizarnotegui's  invoices.  The  itemization  of  merchandise 
delivered  shows  that  the  supplies  ordered  were  not  primarily 
for  the  military  equipment  of  the  soldiers  but  rather  for  the 
civilian  clothing  of  their  families.  The  invoice  for  New  Mex- 
ico's presidio  in  1789  illustrates  this  point.  The  total  bill  of 
goods  from  Jalapa,  Puebla,  Mexico  City,  and  Queretaro  for 
that  year  (excluding  packing  costs,  fees,  commissions,  taxes, 
interest,  and  freightage)  amounted  to  14,029  pesos.  Of  this 
6,391  pesos  (45.5%  of  the  whole)  went  for  dry  goods  bought 
by  the  yard  or  whole  piece ;  2,862  pesos  (20.5% )  for  clothing 
(mostly  feminine)  ;  2,739  pesos  (19.5%)  for  blankets  and 
other  bedding;  1,214  (8.5%)  for  miscellaneous  goods;  540 
pesos  (4.0%)  for  hardware;  and  only  283  pesos  (2.0%)  for 
saddlery  and  other  military  equipment.  Of  the  goods  from 
Michoacan,  amounting  to  1,737  pesos,  545  pesos  (31.5%) 

47.  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  notations  to  invoice  received  February  10,  1790,  SANM, 
archive  1084a. 


PRESIDIO  SUPPLY  229 

went  for  soap ;  470  pesos  (27.0% )  for  brown  sugar;  and  366 
pesos  (21.0%)  for  refined  sugar.  This  left  only  356  pesos 
(20.5%)  for  miscellaneous  goods  including  those  of  military 
utility.48  Arms  and  ammunition  were  customarily  purchased 
by  the  paymasters  directly  from  the  warehouses  maintained 
by  the  royal  treasury  while  horses,  mules,  fodder,  and  most 
of  the  foodstuffs  were  bought  from  the  neighboring  farms 
and  ranches.49  Therefore,  the  merchant  contracts  seem  to 
have  had  little  bearing  on  the  military  equipment  of  the  pre- 
sidial  forces.  In  providing  the  clothing  and  household  needs  of 
their  families,  however,  they  were  vital  to  troop  morale. 

Finally,  it  may  properly  be  assumed  that  the  several  re- 
forms during  the  eighteenth  century  brought  about  some  im- 
provement in  the  welfare  of  presidial  troops  and  their  fam- 
ilies. Their  extreme  poverty,  a  matter  of  frequent  complaint 
in  earlier  years,  seems  to  have  been  somewhat  mitigated  by 
1789,  judging  by  the  luxuries  included  in  their  orders  for 
that  year.  Imported  fabrics  (silk,  British  and  Flemish  linen, 
French  velvet,  Rouen,  Pontevy,  Holland  cloth,  Cambaya,  and 
English  baize)  came  to  3,345  pesos  or  almost  24%  of  the  total 
bill.50  If  the  salaries  of  the  troops  were  still  inadequate  to 
cover  their  expenses,  it  was  due  in  no  small  part  to  their  own 
conspicuous  consumption. 


48.  Guizarnotegui,  invoice  for  the  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  Mexico  City,  October  31, 
1788,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fols.  272-274  ;  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  resume  of  and  notations 
to  invoice  received  from  Guizarnotegui  on  February  3,  1789,  SANM,  archive  1084a. 

49.  Pedro  Galindo  Navarro  (Auditor  of  Provincias  Internas)   to  Ugarte,  Chihuahua, 
February  13,  1787,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.,  13,  fols.  94-102. 

60.  Guizarn6tegui,  invoice  for  the  Presidio  of  Santa  Fe,  Mexico  City,  October  31, 
1788,  AGN,  Prov.  Int.  13,  fols.  272-274. 
[NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW,  Vol.  36,  No.  3.  July,  1961] 


FRANK  BOND:  GENTLEMAN  SHEEPHERDER 
OF  NORTHERN  NEW  MEXICO,  1883-1915 

By  FRANK  H.  GRUBBS 
Bond  &  Weist 

AS  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.,  Wagon  Mound,  entered  its  seventh 
year  of  business,  the  advantages  of  running  large  flocks 
of  sheep  in  the  area  to  the  southeast  were  becoming  apparent. 
This  rolling  plateau  area  in  San  Miguel  and  Leonard  Wood 
Counties  drained  into  the  Canadian  River  on  the  east  and  the 
Pecos  on  the  west,  providing  an  abundance  of  good  water  and 
excellent  grazing.1  The  Bonds  had  already  acquired  the  Tru- 
jillo,  Mogote,  Vermejo,  and  Esteros  ranches,  and  not  long 
thereafter  they  had  followed  this  up  by  purchasing  almost 
63,000  acres  of  the  Preston  Beck  Grant  plus  the  Atencio  and 
La  Posta  ranches  east  of  Cabra.2 

As  the  population  of  partidarios  swelled,  and  as  the 
number  of  independent  flockmasters  in  this  vast  country 
increased,  there  emerged  a  distinct  requirement  for  a  mer- 
cantile store  in  that  area,  not  only  to  supply  their  wants  but 
also  to  provide  better  supervision  of  the  sheep  investment 
and  to  establish  a  local  operating  base  from  which  to  buy 
wool.  Up  to  that  time,  Las  Vegas,  Wagon  Mound,  and 
Springer  had  enjoyed  much  of  the  trade  from  the  east  central 
section  of  the  state,  but  the  Chicago,  Rock  Island,  and  Pacific 
Railroad  was  approaching  the  area  from  the  east,  and  the 
El  Paso  and  Northeastern  was  coming  in  from  the  south. 
Unless  something  were  done  a  significant  part  of  that  trade 
would  certainly  be  lost.  A  new  branch  was  the  obvious  solu- 
tion, and  so  in  the  fall  of  1899 3  a  new  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  store 

1.  Copy  Book  No.  635,  January  27,   1909,  p.   487    (in  the  flies  of  Bond  &  Wiest, 
Cuervo,  New  Mexico).  Source  material  at  Cuervo  cited  hereafter  as  Holbrook  Papers. 

2.  Copy  Book,  March  7,  1913,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

3.  The   earliest  account   in    the   first   ledger   is   dated   August,    1899,   and   the  first 
appearance  of  Cabra  Springs  on  the  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  letterhead  is  dated  January  1, 
1900. 

230 


FRANK  BOND  231 

was  opened  at  Cabra,  New  Mexico,  in  San  Miguel  County 
just  twenty-two  miles  north  of  Santa  Rosa.4 

The  reason  that  Cabra  was  chosen  is  obscure,  but  it  was 
a  stop  on  the  Pony  Express,5  and  considering  the  Bond's  em- 
phasis on  efficient  mail  communication  and  the  necessity  for 
rapid  transmission  of  information  between  their  widely  sepa- 
rated stores,  it  would  seem  to  have  been  a  logical  choice. 
Some  weight  was  also  most  certainly  given  to  the  possibility 
that  the  railroad  would  actually  come  through  Cabra  and 
bring  to  fruition  their  plans  for  exploiting  the  opportunities 
thus  provided.  Their  subsequent  move  to  Cuervo  when  the 
railroad  bypassed  Cabra  seems  to  confirm  this  as  a  considera- 
tion in  their  choice  of  Cabra  as  a  store  location. 

The  new  business  was  financed  by  $10,000  from  the 
Wagon  Mound  store,6  so  the  parties  interested  directly  in  this 
expansion  were  the  Wagon  Mound  partners,  George  and 
Frank  Bond.  However,  in  1899  Archie  MacArthur  was  re- 
ceiving 5  per  cent  of  the  Wagon  Mound  profits,  so  his  interest 
in  the  Cabra  store  is  not  to  be  discounted. 

It  appears  that  the  first  manager  of  this  store  was  A.  H. 
Long  who  was  later  to  be  associated  with  the  Bonds  in  the 
Rosa  Mercantile  Company.7  While  it  later  became  the  general 
policy  upon  the  opening  of  a  new  store  to  give  the  manager  a 
sizable  share  of  the  business,  this  was  not  done  at  Cabra  as, 
indeed,  it  had  not  been  done  at  Wagon  Mound. 

Very  little  is  known  of  the  Cabra  business  operation,  but 
by  the  summer  of  1900  George  Bond  had  decided  to  make  a 
change  at  Cabra  and  replace  Long  with  Andrew  W.  Wiest 
who  was  willing  to  take  the  managership  for  one-half  the 
profits.8  An  account  for  Andy  Wiest  first  appears  in  the  ledger 
on  September  5,  1900,  and  so  it  would  seem  that  the  change 

4.  U.  S.,  Department  of  the  Interior,  General  Land  Office,  Map  of  Territory  of  New 
Mexico.   1"  =  12  mi.,   1903.   Bond's   writings   refer  variously  to   "Cabra,"  and   "Cabra 
Springs."  It  has  also  been  observed  as  "Cobra  Springs"  in  some  published  material,  but 
the  form,  "Cabra,"  used  here  appears  on  the  map  cited  and  is  considered  authoritative. 

5.  Interview  with  J.  S.  Holbrook,  Cuervo,  New  Mexico,  March  1,  1958. 

6.  Records,  toe.  cit. 

7.  This  has  not  been  absolutely  substantiated,  but  examination  of  the  meager  cor- 
respondence points  strongly  to  this  conclusion.  The  Rosa  Mercantile  Co.   is  discussed 
infra,  chap.  xii. 

8.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  June  13,  1900,  Bond  Papers,  toe.  cit. 


232  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

was  promptly  made.  At  the  end  of  that  year,  the  Cabra  store 
owed  the  Wagon  Mound  store  just  over  $14,000.9 

With  the  advent  of  Andy  Wiest  in  1900  as  an  equal  part- 
ner with  the  Bonds,  the  firm  name  was  changed  from  G.  W. 
Bond  &  Bro.  to  Bond  &  Wiest,  the  name  it  has  borne  now  for 
fifty-eight  years.  Wiest's  share  in  the  business  was  without 
any  investment  of  his  own,  but  by  the  end  of  1901,  his  first 
full  year  at  the  helm,  Wiest  had  $3,045.41  in  the  business 
which  represented  his  share  of  the  profits.10  The  first  financial 
picture  of  Bond  &  Wiest  that  can  be  reconstructed  today  is 
presented  in  Table  30. 

TABLE  30 

BOND  &  WIEST  BALANCE  SHEET 

January  10, 1902 

Resources 

Book  Accounts  $  4,859.00 

Notes   294.84 

Sheep  on  hand  2,524.59 

Wool 9,824.90 

Cattle  8.00 

Cash 210.90 

Merchandise  6,575.39 

Total  $24,297.62 

Liabilities 

Due  Sundry  Persons $      343.93 

Due  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro 17,844.88 

Due  A.  W.  Wiest,  profits 3,045.41 

Due  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.,  profits 3,045.42 

Undivided  profits 17.98 

Total  $24,297.62 

The  last  firm  evidence  of  the  store  at  Cabra  is  an  invoice 
dated  September  10,  1901.11  At  some  time  between  this  date 
and  the  end  of  1903,  the  Bond  &  Wiest  store  was  moved  to 
Cuervo,  New  Mexico,  a  small  community  about  fifteen  miles 
east  of  Santa  Rosa.12  However,  there  is  evidence  to  indicate 
that  the  move  actually  took  place  in  1902. 

9.  Records,  loc.  dt. 

10.  Ibid. 

11.  Copy  Book,  September  10,  1901,  p.  185,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

12.  The  "Old  Observer,"  in  describing  a  visit  to  the  Bond  &  Wiest  store,  refers  to 
its  location  in  "Cuervito."  He  also  referred,  erroneously,  to  Wiest  as  "Mr.  Frank  Wiest." 
"The  Old  Observer  in  New  Mexico,"  The  American  Shepherd's  Bulletin,  XI,  No.  6  (June, 
1906),  525  (49). 


FRANK  BOND  233 

The  move  to  Cuervo  was  almost  certainly  motivated  by 
the  arrival  of  the  railroad  which  came  not  through  Cabra 
but  through  Tucumcari,  Cuervo,  and  Santa  Rosa.13  The 
Bonds  were  not  alone  in  quickly  realizing  the  advantages  to 
be  gained  by  establishing  themselves  in  a  competitive  trans- 
portation position,  for  the  Charles  Ilfeld  Company  made  a 
coincident  move  in  1904  and  established  a  branch  in  Santa 
Rosa.14 

The  Cuervo  store  was  first  opened  in  temporary  quar- 
ters,15 building  construction  was  begun,  and  the  Cabra  store 
was  closed  permanently.  The  new  store  building  was  com- 
pleted in  1903,  and  before  the  year  was  out  the  floor  space 
had  to  be  more  than  doubled  by  building  a  warehouse.  This 
brought  the  building  investment  to  $4,827.51  at  the  end  of 
December.16 

The  profit-sharing  arrangement  between  the  Bonds  and 
Andy  Wiest  was  undisturbed  until  1904  when  the  Bond  & 
Wiest  Corporation  was  formed  with  George  W.  Bond  as 
president,  Frank  Bond  as  vice-president,  and  Andrew  W. 
Wiest  as  secretary  and  treasurer.17  "Having  incorporated 
this  new  company  for  the  purpose  of  handling  their  business 
as  a  corporation  rather  than  as  a  firm,"18  the  new  corpora- 
tion bought  the  assets  of  the  old  firm  of  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro. 
by  giving  12,501  shares  of  stock  to  Frank  Bond,  12,500  to 
G.  W.  Bond,  and  24,999  shares  to  A.  W.  Wiest.19  There  were 
a  total  of  50,000  shares  issued. 

13.  Interview  with  J.  S.  Holbrook. 

Belying  the  present  appearance  of  Cuervo,  the  prospects  and  hopes  at  that  time  for 
expansion  of  the  community  are  evident  from  a  reference  in  a  letter  written  by  Andy 
Wiest  in  which  he  referred  to  the  "Gross-Kelly  Addition  to  the  Town  of  Cuervo."  Copy 
Book  No.  635,  p.  352,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  eit. 

The  railroad  actually  arrived  in  Santa  Rosa  on  Christmas  Day  in  1901.  Interview 
with  C.  H.  Stearns,  Albuquerque,  April  12,  1958. 

14.  Copy  Book  No.  71,  August  7,   1902,  p.  43  and  August  12,   1902,  p.   116,  in  the 
Charles  Ilfeld  Business   Collection    (University  of  New  Mexico  Library,  Albuquerque), 
cited  by  William  J.  Parish,  unpublished  MS,  chap,  xi,  p.  29. 

15.  Interview  with  J.  S.  Holbrook. 

16.  Records,  loc.  tit. ;  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Franklin  Bond,  September  2,  1903, 
Bond  Papers,  lac.  cit.  George  always  addressed  his  brother  as  "Franklin,"  both  orally 
and  in  correspondence.  He  was  the  only  one  given  this  privilege. 

17.  Minutes  of  First  Stockholders'  Meeting,  April  21,   1904,   Holbrook  Papers,   loc. 
cit.  Note  also  that  the  A.   MacArthur   Company,   Wagon   Mound,   was  organized  as  a 
corporation  just  two  months  later  in  the  same  year.  Supra,  chap.  iv. 

18.  Minutes  of  Special  Meeting,  April  21,  1904,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

19.  Ibid. 


234  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

This  division  of  the  stock  gave  the  Bonds  a  one-share 
control  of  the  company.  At  the  time  of  incorporation,  the 
Bonds  had  an  interest  in  the  business  of  just  under  $14,000, 
including  undivided  profits,  and  Wiest's  comparable  interest 
amounted  to  slightly  more  than  $10,000.20  The  additional 
$15,000  needed  by  Wiest  and  the  extra  $11,000  needed  by 
the  Bonds  to  take  up  their  respective  stock  was  placed  on 
the  Bond  &  Wiest  books  as  a  receivable.  These  sums  were 
carried  by  the  business  until  1906  when  accumulated  profits 
of  $19,200  were  divided  and  offset  against  these  accounts  to 
reduce  the  loans  to  the  stockholders.  In  1908  additional  ac- 
cumulated profits  of  $27,000  were  divided,  thus  finally  enabl- 
ing Wiest  as  well  as  the  Bonds  to  liquidate  all  debts  to  the 
company. 

Until  it  was  finally  possible  to  get  rid  of  the  capital  dilu- 
tion that  had  been  introduced  at  the  time  of  the  incorpora- 
tion, nothing  was  realized  by  any  of  the  participants  in  the 
form  of  profit  distribution.  Wiest  simply  drew  a  store  man- 
ager's salary  of  $75  per  month  beginning  in  1904  which  was 
raised  to  $100  in  1905  and  to  $125  in  1907.21 

The  above  corporate  structure  stood  until  1906  when  Joe 
Holbrook,  Jr.,  became  a  stockholder.  Holbrook  was  a  native 
of  Philadelphia  whose  father  operated  an  Indian  commissary 
in  Cimarron.  He  had  been  a  sheepherder  for  a  number  of 
years  and  then  operated  a  meat  market  in  Wagon  Mound 
before  joining  the  Bonds  at  Cabra  where  he  bought  sheep, 
worked  in  the  store,  and  ran  the  post  office.22  The  first  positive 
evidence  of  his  presence  is  contained  in  his  personal  account 
which  was  opened  in  December,  1901,23  although  one  his- 
torian dates  his  arrival  several  years  earlier.24  His  rise,  how- 
ever, in  the  Bond  organization  began  in  1906  when  Andy 
Wiest  transferred  1,600  shares  of  stock  to  him.25 

20.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

21.  Minutes  of  Board  of  Directors'  Meeting,  April  21,  1904,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc. 
cit. ;  ibid.,  March  6,  1905  ;  ibid..  March  4,  1907. 

22.  Interview  with  J.  S.  Holbrook ;  Davis,  op.  cit.,  p.  1631. 

23.  Ledger,  p.  613,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

24.  Davis  (loc.  cit.)  writes  that  Holbrook  went  to  "Capos  [sic]  Springs"  in  1895  and 
bought  sheep  for  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  The  Bonds  were  probably  buying  and  renting  sheep 
in  the  Cabra  area  that  early  even  though  the  store  was  not  opened  until  1899,  but  the 
dates  and  sequence  of  events  in  Davis'  biography  are  self -contradictory. 

25.  Minutes  of  Board  of  Directors'  Meeting,  March  3,  1913,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 


FRANK  BOND  235 

Andy  Wiest's  services  to  the  Cuervo  store  began  to  be 
divided  when  Archie  MacArthur  was  stricken  at  Wagon 
Mound  in  1911  and  Wiest  began  to  manage  both  stores  simul- 
taneously. This  gave  Holbrook  the  opportunity  to  prove  his 
mettle  during  Wiest's  increasingly  frequent  absences,  and 
in  1912  he  was  given  deserved  recognition  by  being  appointed 
assistant  general  manager,  although  it  is  probable  that  by 
this  time  Wiest  was  in  Wagon  Mound  so  much  of  the  time 
that  Holbrook  was  for  all  practical  purposes  in  complete 
charge  of  the  Cuervo  operation.  His  services  in  this  capacity 
were  apparently  well  appreciated  for  at  the  end  of  the  year 
George  Bond  sent  him  a  bonus  of  an  undisclosed  but  appar- 
ently substantial  amount — an  action  without  precedent  in 
the  Bond  system.26 

In  1913,  Andy  Wiest  transferred  2,000  more  shares  of 
stock  to  Holbrook  just  before  a  profit  distribution.27  The 
nature  of  the  conditions  under  which  Wiest  transferred  his 
holdings  to  Holbrook  from  time  to  time  are  undisclosed,28  but 
it  was  probably  a  private  agreement  inasmuch  as  Wiest  and 
Holbrook  were  double  brothers-in-law,  each  having  married 
the  other's  sister.29 

By  1912  George  Bond  was  living  in  Idaho  and  from  a 
practical  viewpoint  his  functioning  as  president  was  greatly 
diminished.  He  was  for  this  reason  dropped  from  the  Board 
of  Directors,30  and  Frank  Bond  became  president,  Andy 
Wiest  was  elected  vice-president  and  Holbrook  was  named 
secretary,  treasurer,  and  general  manager.31  The  following 
year  George  and  Frank  Bond  each  transferred  1,000  shares 
of  stock  to  Holbrook,32  and  so  at  the  end  of  1915  the  stock- 
holdings stood  as  shown  in  Table  31. 

26.  Copy  Book,  January  20,  1913,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

27.  Minutes  of  Board  of  Directors'  Meeting,  March  3,  1913,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

28.  The  stockholders'  record  of  April  4,  1910,  shows  that  24,999  shares  were  jointly 
owned  by  Wiest  and  Holbrook.  It  was  not  until  1913  that  a  correction,  retroactive  to 
1906,  was  made  showing  Holbrook  as  owner  of  any  shares  in  his  own  right.  Ibid. 

29.  Interviews  with  J.  E.  Davenport,  J.  S.  Holbrook,  and  C.  H.  Stearns.  To  further 
complicate  the  family  relationships,  Holbrook's  sister,  Emma,  married  Manuel  Paltenghe 
at  Wagon  Mound.  Ibid. 

30.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

81.  Minutes  of  Stockholders'  Meeting,  August  13,  1914,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

82.  Minutes  of  Board  of  Directors'  Meeting,  April  10,  1915,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 


236  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

TABLE  31 
STOCKHOLDERS,  BOND  &  WIEST,  1915 

Name  Shares 

G.  W.  Bond 11,500 

Frank  Bond 11,501 

A.  W.  Wiest 21,399 

J.  Holbrook,  Jr 5,600 

Total  50,000 

Throughout  the  period  ending  with  the  close  of  1915, 
merchandise  not  only  represented  the  heaviest  single  invest- 
ment of  Bond  &  Wiest  but  also  accounted  for  the  largest 
single  item  of  profit.  The  division  point  on  the  railroad  was 
located  just  a  few  miles  southwest,  and  the  area  was  prosper- 
ous. Cuervo  was  enjoying  a  period  of  expansion;  there  ap- 
pears to  have  been  no  serious  competition  in  the  merchandise 
field ;  and  the  store  was  piled  high  with  calico,  flour,  and  all 
the  traditional  inventory  of  a  country  store.  The  trade  cus- 
tomarily bought  supplies  for  as  long  as  an  entire  year  at  a 
time,  a  heavy  inventory  of  goods  was  needed  to  supply  their 
wants,  and  wholesale  purchases  of  10,000  pounds  of  beans 
or  20,000  pounds  of  potatoes  were  not  uncommon.33  The  year 
end  investments  and  gross  profits  on  merchandise  for  the 
period  through  1915  are  shown  in  Table  32. 

Sales  data  for  only  a  few  years  are  available,  but  they 
indicate  a  rapid  rise  from  $44,230.32  in  1905  to  a  peak  of 
almost  $96,000  in  1908.34  By  1912  they  had  dropped  to  less 
than  $61,000,  but  in  1915  they  were  back  up  to  about  $79,000. 
It  was  not  unusual  for  more  than  half  the  sales  to  be  on  credit, 
and  as  a  result  the  accounts  receivable  carried  by  Bond  & 
Wiest  were  a  sizable  item.  They  are  shown  in  Table  33.  These 
book  accounts  were  regarded  as  being  ninety  per  cent  good, 
which  was  a  conservative  estimate.  In  fact,  the  actual  loss 
was  less  than  4  per  cent  in  1912.35 

The  merchandise  business  was  closely  associated  with  the 
railroad,  and  in  the  early  years  Cuervo  was  a  regular  stop. 
Not  only  was  this  an  asset  by  way  of  widening  the  marketing 

83.  Copy  Book,  October  12,  1904,  p.  135,  Holbrook  Papers,  toe.  eft. 

34.  Copy  Book,  February  11,  1906,  p.  553,  Holbrook  Papers,  toe  tit. ;  Record*,  toe  cit. 

35.  Ibid. 


FRANK  BOND  237 

TABLE  32 

MERCHANDISE  INVENTORY 
AND  GROSS  PROFIT  ON  MERCHANDISE 

BOND  &  WIEST 
(dollars  in  thousands) 


Year 

Inventory 

Profit 

1903 
1904 

1905 
1906 
1907 
1908 
1909 
1910 
1911 
1912 
1913 
1914 
1915 

$  8.1 
12.2 
12.9 
14.4 
26.4 
25.1 
25.6 
24.5 
20.3 
18.9 
17.8 
17.5 
18.5 

$.    .    . 

6.9 

11.5 
10.3 

3.8 
4.1 
4.4 
9.4 

TABLE  33 
BOND  &  WIEST  BOOK  ACCOUNTS" 
(dollars  in  thousands) 

Year 

Amount 

1903  

$  8.7 
9.8 
13.4 
15.1 
17.2 
11.8 
6.5 
8.7 
8.5 
16.6 
13.3 
17.2 
21.3 

ion.  In  1905 

1904  

1905  

1906  

1907  

1908  

1909  

1910  

1911  

1912  

1913  

1914  

1915  

area  but  also  it 
Wiest  wrote  : 

sharpened  the  price 

competit 

a.  The  very  existence  of  these  credit  sales  and  book  accounts  lends  a  puzzling  aspect 
to  Frank  Bond's  comment  to  George  in  1911  that  there  was  no  credit  business  in  Cuervo. 
Letter  Book  No.  6,  July  8,  1911. 


238  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Profits  do  not  show  up  as  well  as  last  year,  yet  we  sold  more 
goods,  our  sales  were  37412.00  dollars,  accounting  for  this  is 
that  there  is  too  much  strive  [sic]  for  the  trade  that  is  tribu- 
tary to  the  Rock  Island,  to  hold  or  get  the  trade  prices  have  to 
be  figured  very  close,  we  believe  we  are  getting  our  share.36 

The  regular  train  service  to  Cuervo  was  discontinued  by  the 
end  of  1904,37  but  it  continued  to  be  a  flag  stop  and  as  such 
provided  adequate  facilities  to  the  Bonds  for  mail  and  mer- 
chandise service.  However,  after  December  1, 1910,  the  trains 
no  longer  stopped  there  at  all,38  and  the  slow  strangulation 
of  Cuervo  began.  This  must  have  been  a  source  of  keen  dis- 
appointment for  railroad  accessibility  had  indeed  been  the 
desideratum  when  the  decision  to  locate  in  Cuervo  was  made 
nine  years  previously.  Certainly  the  effect  on  the  merchan- 
dise trade  is  obvious,  for  after  1910  it  began  a  steady  decline. 
A  number  of  efforts  were  made  to  regain  the  railroad  stop 
but  without  avail.  In  fact,  while  mail  service  did  continue  on 
a  drop-and-pick-up  basis,  it  finally  deteriorated  to  an  in- 
tolerable point,  and  the  trains  would  roar  through  town 
leaving  the  pouches  on  the  pick-up  arms.39 

Sheep  and  wool  at  Cuervo  were,  of  course,  the  important 
activities  not  only  because  their  combined  profits  were  sizable 
but  also  because  they  were  unaffected  by  the  discontinuance 
of  passenger  train  service  in  1910.  In  the  first  year  of  busi- 
ness Bond  &  Wiest  shipped  300,000  pounds  of  wool,  and  their 
wool  purchases  for  the  first  half  of  1904  amounted  to  125,000 
pounds.40  The  Tucumcari  Wool  Scouring  Mills  were  located 
not  too  far  away,41  and  doubtless  some  of  the  Bond  &  Wiest 

36.  Letter  of  A.  W.  Wiest  to  Frank  Bond,  February  11,  1906,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 
Wiest  seems  to  have  had  an  aversion  to  the  use  of  periods  and  upper  case  letters.  The 
substitution  of  commas  for  sentence  periods  and  failure  to  capitalize  first  words  makes 
his    correspondence    particularly    difficult    to    read.    The    Bonds,    incidentally,    did    thia 
occasionally  also,  but  to  a  much  lesser  degree.  Their  contemporaries  do  not  now  recall 
any  particular  reason  for  it. 

37.  Copy  Book,  January  24,  1905,  p.  260,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

38.  Ibid.,  December  23,  1910. 

39.  Copy  Book,  passim,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

40.  Ibid.,  January  2,  1905,  p.  289 ;  ibid.,  July  27,  1904,  p.  40. 

41.  Ibid.,  June  22,  1905,  p.  362  ;  ibid.,  n.d.,  p.  388.  The  Tucumcari  Wool  Scouring 
Company  was  incorporated  in  1904  for  $25,000  by  E.  J.  Ruling  (infra,  chap,  viii),  M.  C. 
Mechman,  and  Solomon  Floersheim.  It  had  a  capacity  of  16,000  pounds  of  wool  per  day. 
The  American  Shepherd's  Bulletin,  IX,  No.  6  (June,  1904),  698  (82). 


FRANK  BOND  239 

wools  were  shipped  there  although  Brown  and  Adams  in 
Boston  were  the  largest  buyers  and  for  many  years  enjoyed 
practically  all  of  the  Cuervo  business.42  The  hold  that  Brown 
and  Adams  had  on  the  wools  in  that  area  was  a  source  of 
some  annoyance  to  Holbrook  who,  after  a  visit  by  Mr.  Adams, 
was  led  to  remark  that  Adams  thought  he  had  a  cinch  on  the 
Cuervo  wools  "but  I  will  be  D  [sic]  if  we  consign  to  him  until 
we  know  he  has  us  cornered."43  Later,  of  course,  much  of  the 
wool  business  was  shifted  to  Hallowell,  Jones,  &  Donald  as 
all  the  Bond  business  began  to  drift  away  from  Brown  and 
Adams.44 

At  one  time  the  Bonds  had  up  to  30,000  head  of  sheep  on 
the  grant  lands  north  of  Cuervo,45  but  the  Bond  &  Wiest  sheep 
were  of  a  lesser  order.  In  1908  Bond  &  Wiest  had  10,000 
sheep  on  the  Beck  Grant,  paying  one  cent  per  head  per  month 
rent  for  grazing,46  but  in  response  to  an  inquiry  Wiest  wrote : 

We  know  of  no  other  land  this  side  of  the  Pecos  River  where 
5,000  head  of  sheep  could  be  grazed,  all  available  land  is  being 
taken  up  very  rapidly  by  the  homesteaders,  this  means  that  the 
sheep  business  in  this  section  will  soon  be  a  thing  of  the  past.47 

However,  at  the  end  of  1915,  Bond  &  Wiest  still  had  slightly 
more  than  11,000  sheep,  of  which  8,800  were  on  rent.48 

Pertinent  investment  and  profit  data  on  sheep  and  wool 
are  shown  in  Table  34. 

A  small  but  lively  business  was  conducted  at  Cuervo  in 
hides,  pelts,  and  cattle.  Handling  of  hides  and  pelts  seems 
to  have  begun  in  1903  and  continued  without  much  change 
through  1915.  Wiest  mentions  having  over  2,000  pounds  of 

42.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  June  11,  1915,  p.  460. 

43.  Copy  Book,  July  10,  1913,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

44.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  June  11,  1915,  p.  460. 

45.  Cow  Book,  July  7,  1904,  p.  9,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  eit. 

46.  Copy  Book  No.  635,  January  27,  1909,  p.  487,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit.  Wiest 
frequently  called  it  the  "Cabra  Grant." 

The  rental  contract  on  the  grant  with  J.  D.  Hand  expired  in  June,  1906,  and  the 
grant  was  sold  in  1907  to  A.  A.  Jones,  so  it  appears  that  Bond  &  Wiest  were  paying 
Jones  in  1908  for  running  sheep  on  the  grant.  Copy  Book,  February  10,  1906,  p.  550, 
Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. ;  supra,  pp.  80-81 ;  interview  with  Harry  R.  Roberson, 
Albuquerque,  April  12,  1958. 

47.  Ibid. 

48.  Records,  loc.  cit. 


240 


NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 


pelts  and  some  goat  skins  on  hand  as  early  as  1904,49  and  the 
following  year  Wiest  arranged  with  the  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro. 
Mercantile  Company  in  Encino  to  send  their  hides  to  Cuervo 
for  shipment.50  Wiest  handled  the  hides  without  charge  and 
Encino  thus  gained  a  freight  rate  advantage  by  shipping 
from  Cuervo.51  In  addition,  combining  their  shipments  en- 
abled them  to  confine  their  shipping  to  carload  lots  and  thus 
take  a  further  freight  rate  advantage.52  Wiest  pursued  this 
with  some  vigor  and  worked  with  C.  H.  Stearns  in  Santa 
Rosa  in  the  same  way.53  Year  end  investments  in  hides  gen- 
erally were  in  the  modest  range  of  two  to  three  hundred  dol- 
lars although  at  the  end  of  1906  over  $1,000  worth  were  on 
hand.  The  profit  realized  was  likewise  modest,  averaging 
about  $500  a  year  with  the  exception  of  1905  which  doubled 
that.54 

TABLE  34 

BOND  &  WIEST  SHEEP  AND  WOOL 
(dollars  in  thousands) 


Year 

Year-end 
Sheep  Investment 

Profit 
on  Sheep 

Profit 
on  Wool 

1903 

$  0.0 

$.   .   . 

$.   .   . 

1904 

2.3 

.   .   . 

... 

1905 

2.2 

2.8 

1.2 

1906 

8.1 

... 

... 

1907 

2.6 

3.4 

2.2 

1908 

11.1 

.0 

.0 

1909 

17.7 

.  .  . 

.  .  . 

1910 

15.2 

... 

... 

1911 

10.3 

.  .  . 

1912 

12.4 

3.1 

3.2 

1913 

20.1 

5.9 

1.4 

1914 

20.8 

5.0 

1.6 

1915 

38.1 

8.4 

1.1 

49.  Copy  Book,  July  23,  1904,  p.  83  ;  Holbrook  Papers,  loe.  cit. 

50.  Ibid.,  n.d.,  p.  544. 

51.  Ibid. 

52.  Copy  Book  No.  635,  May  9,  1907,  p.  216,  Holbrook  Papers,  loe.  cit. 

63.  Ibid.  Stearns  operated  a  general  store  in  Santa  Rosa  and  frequently  ran  sheep 
with  Wiest.  He  recalls  selling  hides  and  pelts  with  Wiest  also  but  had  Vorenberg  come 
down  from  Wagon  Mound  to  sort  and  price  them  first.  Interview  with  C.  H.  Stearns. 

54.  Records,  loe.  cit. 


FRANK  BOND  241 

Cattle  holdings  were  sporadic,  being  insignificant  most 
of  the  time.  However,  there  were  over  $2,000  worth  of  cattle 
in  1909  and  slightly  less  in  1910.  At  the  end  of  1915,  Bond 
&  Wiest  had  157  head  of  cattle  costing  almost  $6,000.55  Profits 
on  the  sale  of  cattle  were  insignificant. 

Book  accounts  were  carried  by  Bond  &  Wiest  in  amounts 
ranging  to  $17,000,  with  the  balance  at  the  end  of  1915  being 
slightly  more  than  $21,000.  However,  cash  balances  were 
adequate  at  all  times,  accounts  being  maintained  in  both  the 
Santa  Rosa  bank  and  in  the  bank  at  El  Paso,  Texas,  up 
through  1912. 

Overall  profits  show  that  the  Cuervo  branch  was  a  good 
investment,  total  net  profits  of  the  business  being  as  shown 
in  Table  35. 

TABLE  35 

BOND  &  WIEST  NET  PROFITS 
(dollars  in  thousands) 


Year 

Amount 

1904  

$  7.0 

1905  

12.2 

1906  

8.3 

1907  

18.7 

1908  

13.3 

1909  

12.2 

1910  

5.6 

1911  

5.3 

1912  

11.8 

1913  

13.9 

1914  

14.4 

1915  

16.7 

Notwithstanding  the  obviously  profitable  business  at 
Cuervo,  there  was  early  talk  of  selling  out.56  This  first  sug- 
gestion in  1911  by  Wiest  was  probably  sparked  by  a  sudden 
necessity  for  him  to  spend  a  great  deal  of  time  at  Wagon 
Mound  for  prior  to  that  time  the  general  economic  outlook  in 
that  area  had  not  been  at  all  dismal.  In  fact,  there  had  been 
talk  of  expansion  some  years  earlier  when  it  was  rumored 
that  the  Bonds  were  putting  in  a  business  at  Moriarty57  and 

65.  Ibid. 

56.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  July  8,  1911. 

57.  They  never  did. 


242  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

that  Gross-Kelly  was  moving  into  Willard.58  It  was  shortly 
thereafter  that  Charles  Ilfeld  inquired  about  renting  the 
store  building  at  Cabra,59  probably  with  the  thought  of  open- 
ing a  store.  Bond  refused. 

Even  at  the  same  time  that  Andy  Wiest  was  suggesting 
that  the  Cuervo  store  be  sold,  a  new  industry  was  invading 
Cuervo.  The  amole  plant  was  being  cut,  dried  in  the  sun  for 
sixty  days,  then  shipped  east  for  use  in  the  manufacture  of 
rope.60  Wiest  did  some  trading  in  it ;  he  bought  the  dried  plant 
for  seven  dollars  a  ton  and  sold  it  for  eight  dollars.61 

The  subject  of  selling  out  at  Cuervo  was  dropped  for  the 
time  being,  but  Joe  Holbrook  brought  it  up  again  in  1915. 
Frank  Bond  had  no  particular  objection  to  selling  if  Hol- 
brook wanted  to,  but  he  didn't  believe  that  Holbrook  was 
really  serious,  feeling  that  the  Cuervo  store  would  continue 
to  pay  as  well  as  the  other  stores.62  Holbrook  was  by  this  time 
discouraged  at  the  declining  sheep  and  wool  prospects.  Bond 
was  sympathetic  but  noted  that  despite  having  exerted  every 
effort  to  retain  enough  ewes  in  the  country  to  provide  flock 
increases,  the  number  of  sheep  was  nevertheless  dwindling.63 
Harry  Kelly  went  so  far  as  to  say  that  within  a  short  time 
there  would  be  no  ewes  at  all  in  San  Miguel  County.64 

These  thoughts  were  a  part  of  the  gloom  of  the  times  in 
an  area  which  had  now  started  toward  the  eventual  loss  of 
its  major  industries,  but  Bond  and  Wiest  were  both  satisfied 
with  the  showing  there,65  and  Wiest  wanted  Holbrook  at 
Wagon  Mound  which  may  have  been  contributory  to  his 
wanting  to  sell.86  However,  Holbrook  continued  to  run  the 
store,  run  sheep,  buy  and  sell  wool,  and  all  the  myriad  activi- 
ties devolving  upon  a  Bond  manager.  Like  Frank  Bond  at  Es- 

58.  Copy  Book,  July  11,  1904,  p.  11,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  eft. 

59.  Ibid.,  August  80,  1904,  p.  87. 

60.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  July  8,  1911. 

61.  Ibid.  The  amole  plant  has  detergent  properties  and  its  rootstock  is  normally  used 
as  a  substitute  for  soap.  Wiest  mentions  "rope,"  however.  At  the  same  time  he  stated  his 
distrust  of  dry  farmers  and  said  that  he  would  pay  them   only   after  the  cars   were 
actually  loaded. 

62.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  August  11,  1915,  p.  884. 

63.  Ibid. 

64.  Ibid. 

65.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  January  19,  1915,  p.  533. 

66.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  January  20,  1914. 


FRANK  BOND  243 

panola  and  like  Andy  Wiest  before  him  at  Cuervo,  Holbrook 
was  active  on  the  District  School  Board  and  attended,  for 
instance,  to  such  miscellaneous  matters  as  trying  to  get  Don 
Grabiel  [sic]  Chavez'  son  pardoned  from  the  state  penitenti- 
ary.67 He  acted  as  agent  for  Henry  Posha  of  German  Valley, 
Illinois,  who  owned  one  of  the  grants,68  and  found  a  buyer 
for  two  ranches  that  George  Bond  owned  on  the  east  side  of 
the  Beck  Grant.69  A.  H.  Long  continued  to  own  property  in 
Cuervo,70  and  Joe  Holbrook,  Jr.,  doubtless  looked  after  that 
property  also.  His  son,  J.  S.  Holbrook,  is  still  in  Cuervo  and 
operates  the  business  today. 


67.  Copy  Book,  October  18,  1904,  p.  152,  Holbrook  Papers,  loc.  cit. ;  ibid.,  July  19, 
1911 ;  ibid..  August  21,  1912. 

68.  Ibid.,  March  5,  1913. 

69.  Ibid.,  March  7,  1918. 

70.  Ibid.,  November  14,  1912.  Long  had  married  the  daughter  of  W.  R.  Lott  who  had 
property  holdings  in  Cuervo  also.  Interview  with  H.  R.  Roberson. 


Book  Reviews 

The  Jews  of  California  from  the  Discovery  of  Gold  until  1880. 
By  Rudolf  Glanz,  New  York,  1960,  with  the  help  of  the 
Southern  California  Jewish  Historical  Society.  Pp.  viii, 
188. 

An  introductory  chapter,  dealing  in  broad  sweeps,  whets 
the  appetite  of  the  reader  to  the  expectation  of  consuming  a 
serious,  analytical  study — an  analysis  that  never  quite  mate- 
rializes. What  does  come  forth  is  a  factually  packed  volume 
derived  from  meticulous  combing  of  primary  and  other  sound 
sources.  Even  so,  it  is  weakened  by  the  repetitiousness  of 
similar  fact,  much  of  which  could  have  been  avoided  by  a 
more  balanced  grouping  of  imaginative  topics.  The  last  eleven 
of  the  book's  fifteen  chapters,  comprising  but  one-third  of 
the  pages,  but  embracing  important  and  promising  subjects, 
suggest  the  opportunities  that  were  available  to  the  author. 

The  heavy  concentration  of  Jews  in  San  Francisco  with 
the  flower  of  their  mercantile  interests  dominating  smaller 
economic  communities,  including  Los  Angeles,  is  recognized 
frequently  by  the  author  but  is  not  developed  as  a  thesis.  The 
permanent  residence  of  these  people  is  a  matter  of  occasional 
comment.  Yet  what  would  seem  to  follow,  a  major  contribu- 
tion to  the  cultural  life  of  the  communities,  is  seldom  ap- 
proached with  a  positive  flavor. 

If,  in  spite  of  the  introductory  chapter,  the  author  had 
meant  to  limit  his  objective  to  a  simple  descriptive  but  factu- 
ally accurate  story,  the  book  could  be  read  much  less  criti- 
cally. It  would  have  been  helpful  in  any  case,  however,  if  a 
preface  setting  forth  these  limits  of  treatment  had  been  writ- 
ten, and  if  an  index  and  bibliography  had  been  constructed. 

It  is  evident  that  Dr.  Glanz  has  uncovered,  for  this  study, 
adequate  factual  material  which,  if  coupled  with  his  known 
rich  background  in  Jewish  cultural  history,  should  have  pro- 
duced a  more  expansive  and  significant  analysis  of  Jewish 
contributions  to  the  early  development  of  California. 
University  of  New  Mexico  WM.  J.  PARISH 

244 


BOOK  REVIEWS  245 

Indians,  Infants  and  Infantry:  Andrew  and  Elizabeth  Burt 
on  the  Frontier.  By  Merrill  J.  Mattes.  Denver :  The  Old 
West  Publishing  Company,  1960.  Preface,  end-plate 
maps,  illustrations,  index.  Pp.  304.  $5.95. 

By  and  large,  the  last  frontier  was  a  man's  frontier.  The 
fur  trapper,  the  miner  and  the  cowboy  found  it  so,  and  until 
the  "sodbuster"  brought  in  his  family  to  till  the  land  women 
were  mighty  scarce  articles.  The  ordinary  soldier,  in  his 
grim,  louse-infested  barracks,  was  aware  of  this  ugly  truth. 
He  knew  that  "rank  has  its  privileges,"  one  of  which  was 
that  of  the  officers  to  bring  their  wives  and  children  to  the 
lonely  outposts  that  stood  forlornly  against  the  western  back- 
drop. Occasionally  these  frontierswomen  sought  to  escape 
from  the  tedium  of  army  post  life  by  keeping  journals  in 
which  they  noted  the  things  that  interested  them.  Elizabeth 
Burt,  wife  of  career  officer  Andrew  Burt,  was  one  of  them, 
and  through  her  eyes  we  see  another  side  of  army  life. 

The  diaries  kept  by  Elizabeth  Burt  have  been  lost,  but  a 
good  deal  of  the  information  they  contained  went  into  a 
reminiscence  she  wrote  in  1912.  The  important  thing  about 
this  writing  is  that  it  was  done  with  the  diaries  before  her, 
setting  it  apart  from  many  other  frontier  recollections  that 
depend  upon  memory.  Her  manuscript,  "An  Army  Wife's 
Forty  Years  in  the  Service,"  covered  most  of  her  fifty-three 
year  marriage  to  Burt,  but  of  particular  interest  to  histor- 
ians of  the  plains  West  is  the  fact  that  over  half  of  it  dealt 
with  the  crucial  years  1866-1876. 

Elizabeth  Burt's  story  not  only  supplements  a  good  deal 
of  the  information  already  known  to  historians,  but  it  adds 
to  that  side  of  western  life  of  which  so  little  has  been  written : 
the  woman's  view,  family  life.  Merrill  Mattes  has  done  a 
great  deal  with  his  materials  at  hand,  carefully  supplement- 
ing the  document  with  lengthy  explanatory  discourses  that 
fill  any  gaps  and  make  the  whole  fabric  not  only  good  reading 
but  entirely  useful  as  a  contribution  to  western  history. 

Through  this  intelligent  and  observant  woman's  eyes,  one 
follows  the  family  to  Fort  Kearny,  Nebraska,  in  the  critical 
year,  1866,  and  on  to  Fort  Bridger  in  southwestern  Wyo- 


246  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ming,  followed  closely  by  an  assignment  to  Fort  C.  F.  Smith, 
on  the  southern  Montana  segment  of  the  Bozeman  Trail. 
Here  the  Burts  moved  into  Red  Cloud's  country  at  a  time 
when  that  famous  road  was  under  siege  by  the  Sioux,  and 
Fort  Smith,  so  little  known  in  history,  comes  to  life  at  the 
hands  of  an  army  wife  who  not  only  followed  her  husband  to 
this  distant  outpost  but  took  along  a  small  baby.  This  is  the 
heart  of  the  book,  the  zenith  of  Mrs.  Burt's  military  experi- 
ence, and  its  words  are  a  bonanza  to  both  historian  and  lay 
reader.  There  is  an  excellent  account  of  leaving  the  Fort 
when  the  Bozeman  Trail  posts  were  given  up  by  the  army  in 
1868. 

From  1874  to  1876  the  Burts  were  at  Fort  Laramie, 
again  finding  themselves  in  the  center  of  events  that  led  to 
the  climax  at  the  Little  Big  Horn  in  the  latter  year.  One 
does  not  find  here  the  usual  portrayal  of  these  significant 
military  actions,  but  instead  the  richness  of  experience  re- 
lated by  one  who  waited  nearby,  saw  the  coming  and  going 
of  the  troops,  and  watched  anxiously  for  word  from  the 
front.  Mrs.  Burt  might  be  said  to  have  been  sitting  in  the 
bleachers,  but  it  takes  nothing  away  from  the  excitement  of 
events  transpiring  on  the  field  of  action.  Her  story  well  com- 
plements the  many  published  stories  of  what  happened  on  the 
field  of  battle.  No  major  work  about  the  days  of  the  Indian 
fighting  army  will  be  written  now  without  reference  to  this 
valuable  contribution  Merrill  Mattes  has  provided. 
University  of  Colorado  ROBERT  G.  ATHEARN 

Victoriano  Huerta:  A  Reappraisal.  William  L.  Sherman  and 
Richard  E.  Greenleaf.  Mexico,  D.  F. :  Imprenta  Aldina, 
1960.  Distributed  by  The  Mexico  City  College  Press. 
Pp.  164. 

For  two  reasons,  this  reviewer  has  approached  this  book 
with  what  may  be  something  less  than  an  objective  state  of 
mind.  One  reason  is  that,  in  his  opinion,  on  a  list  of  Latin 
American  historical  figures  for  whom  biographies  are  "long 
overdue,"  Victoriano  Huerta  should  be  comfortably  en- 
trenched, preferably  buried,  near  or  at  the  bottom.  He  might 


BOOK  REVIEWS  247 

be  worth  a  footnote  by  way  of  reinstatement  of  character; 
he  could  conceivably  be  stretched  to  article-length  treatment 
by  dint  of  painstaking  research  and  careful  presentation. 
In  book-length  treatment,  this  reviewer  finds  his  career  in- 
sufferably dull,  his  mind  a  vacuum,  his  physical  courage  a 
far  too  common  and  misdirected  quality  to  be  interesting, 
and  his  family  life  approximating  that  of  a  Mexican  Babbitt. 

Secondly,  the  reviewer  holds  an  aversion  toward  pub- 
lished works  resting  heavily  upon  secondary  sources.  Such 
works  oblige  one  to  wade  through  masses  of  material  already 
(and  recently)  in  print  in  English  in  order  to  grasp  the  "new 
contribution"  presumably  embedded  in  this  reworked  ore, 
whether  in  the  form  of  "new-fact"  nuggets  or  in  what  pur- 
ports to  be  reinterpretation.  He  regrets  to  report  that  after 
reading  this  book  both  his  prejudices  have  been  deepened. 

The  fault  with  this  work  is  not  in  the  way  in  which  it  is 
written.  The  authors  demonstrate  considerable  skill  in  syn- 
thesizing; their  quotations  are  often  well  chosen  and  are 
revealing  cameos  of  Mexico  during  the  Revolution.  The  fault 
lies  rather  in  the  reasoning  of  the  authors  as  to  why  Huerta 
should  be  reappraised,  the  readers  to  whom  such  reappraisal 
should  be  addressed,  and  the  proper  limitations  of  the  re- 
appraisal given  the  use  of  limited  sources. 

Huerta  has  been  maliciously  defamed  by  propagandists 
of  the  Mexico  Revolution,  whose  outpourings  have  been  un- 
critically absorbed  (the  false  Huerta  is  far  more  interesting 
than  the  real  one)  by  semipopular  writers  in  the  United 
States.  The  authors  of  this  work  feel  that  the  scholarly  world 
should  be  informed  that  Huerta  was,  after  all,  human.  He 
was  not  a  drunkard  for  he  held  his  liquor  well ;  he  did  not 
take  dope  or  indulge  in  sexual  orgies.  This  reviewer  makes 
the  assumption  that  only  the  casual  reader  of  textbook  level 
status  is  in  need  of  this  reminder.  The  book,  however,  carries 
the  baggage  of  footnotes,  conventional  historical  style,  and 
bibliography — the  appendages  but  not  the  content  (due  to 
lack  of  depth  in  research) — of  genuine  scholarship.  It  there- 
by has  been  misconceived  for  it  is  neither  popular  nor  schol- 
arly. 

As  to  the  limitations  of  their  work,  the  authors  proceed 


248  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

to  pass  judgment  on  far  more  serious  matters  than  Huerta's 
character — a  task  for  which  the  amount  of  research  done  ill 
equips  them  to  do.  The  question  of  the  exact  relationship  of 
a  man  to  an  event  as  profound  and  complex  as  the  Mexican 
Revolution  is  a  matter  requiring  the  most  detailed  study. 
It  is,  in  short,  assessing  the  role  of  the  political  leader  within 
the  context  of  multiple  impersonal  forces.  Given  the  several 
forces  of  discontent  unleashed  by  1910,  no  leader  could  com- 
mand a  peaceful,  progressive  Mexico  until  other  impersonal 
forces  came  to  his  aid.  The  authors  seem  to  think  differently. 
Despite  references  to  Charles  Cumberland's  work  (Mexican 
Revolution:  Genesis  Under  Madero,  Austin,  1952,),  they 
adopt  a  pre-Cumberland  view  of  Madero,  selecting  for  cita- 
tion quotations  concerning  Madero's  personal  shortcomings, 
and  justifying  the  coup  of  1913  against  him  on  the  grounds 
that  the  administration  was,  after  all,  weak,  and  that  the 
most  powerful  elements  of  society  were  agitating  for  a 
change.  They  conclude  that  it  is  "more  or  less  certain  that  his 
administration  would  not  have  remained  in  power  for  a  full 
term,  regardless  of  Victoriano  Huerta"  (p.  73).  In  other 
words,  Madero  simply  could  not  maintain  peace  and  order 
and  at  the  same  time  satisfy  discontented  elements.  Concern- 
ing the  conservative  coup  of  1913  (where  the  authors  omit 
mentioning  that  Huerta  made  no  convincing  efforts  to  assault 
the  Ciudadela,  and  used  reinforcements  on  useless  military 
objectives),  the  picture  presented  by  the  authors  is  one  of  a 
much-needed  restorer  of  peace  and  order  who  has  become, 
by  some  miraculous  metamorphosis,  a  social  reformer  de- 
sirous of  advancing  the  land  reform  program  if  Mexican  dis- 
contents and  Woodrow  Wilson  would  only  let  him  alone. 

This  thesis  is  supported  by  extremely  thin  evidence.  As  to 
Huerta's  success  in  restoring  law  and  order,  the  authors  do 
observe  that  revolts  by  Carranza  and  Zapata  were  never 
suppressed.  They  use,  however,  a  comment  by  the  American 
diplomat's  wife,  Mrs.  O'Shaughnessy  (p.  110),  to  support 
the  contention  that  elsewhere  brigandage  and  small-scale 
revolts  had  been  put  down.  It  seems  unlikely  that  Mrs. 
O'Shaughnessy,  or  any  other  person  residing  in  Mexico  City, 
could  know  this  by  other  than  hearsay.  The  fact  that  Huerta, 


BOOK  REVIEWS  249 

previously  innocent  of  ideas,  stated  that  he  would  create  a 
Ministry  of  Agriculture  devoted  in  part  to  land  distribution 
(p.  109)  does  not  make  him  a  social  reformer.  The  authors 
fail  to  observe  that  Huerta's  conservative  support  rested 
exactly  on  the  supposition  that  he  would  not  carry  out  a  pro- 
gram of  this  kind.  It  is,  furthermore,  illogical  to  contend  that 
Huerta  would  have  been  able  to  restore  peace  and  would  have 
advanced  the  Revolution  if  revolts  had  stopped  and  Wilson's 
intervention  had  been  withdrawn,  and,  at  the  same  time,  to 
contend  that  the  reason  Madero  could  not  do  these  things 
was  because  he  was  weak  and  could  not  maintain  control, 
thus  justifying  a  coup  against  him.  Actually  both  Madero 
and  Huerta  were  trying  unsuccessfully  to  ride  the  wild  horse 
of  Revolution.  Both  failed.  If  Madero  had  the  advantage  of 
non-intervention  by  the  United  States,  Huerta  had  the  ad- 
vantage of  conservative  support;  but  neither  of  these  ad- 
vantages could  offset  the  rising  tide  of  the  Revolution.  The 
personalities  of  the  respective  leaders  had  very  little  to  do 
with  the  course  of  events. 

Despite  a  tendency  toward  many  short  sentences  in  suc- 
cession which  create,  at  times,  a  monotonous  effect,  this  book 
is  written  in  crisp  prose  embellished  by  a  number  of  well- 
turned  phrases.  There  are,  however,  a  few  non  sequiturs  and 
occasional  vaguenesses.  In  a  summation  of  pre-revolutionary 
discontent  including  strikes,  examples  of  subversive  litera- 
ture, and  Madero's  political  activities,  the  authors  conclude: 
"The  government  suddenly  realized  that  the  mild  little  agi- 
tator, Madero,  had  created  a  monster  which  eyed  hungrily 
the  National  Palace  in  Mexico  City"  (p.  20).  The  reader  has 
hardly  been  prepared  for  this  sweeping  evaluation  of  Ma- 
dero's influence.  The  meaning  of  the  statement  that  "Huerta's 
seizure  of  power  was  little  more  than  a  fait  accompli  .  .  . 
(the  remainder  of  the  sentence  deals  with  another  thought) 
leaves  this  reviewer  completely  mystified. 

The  book  is  cleanly  edited  with  scrupulous  accuracy  in 
the  accentuation  of  Spanish  words;  apotheoistic  (p.  45), 
however,  does  not  appear  in  the  dictionary.  There  are  one  or 
two  misplaced  relative  pronouns  and  a  dependent  clause  (p. 
12)  is  set  aside  by  a  semicolon  as  though  it  were  independent. 


250  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Sources  are  occasionally  cited  uncritically.  Aside  from 
the  question  of  historical  importance,  Huerta  did  not  die 
poor  simply  because  Samuel  F.  Bemis  "states  flatly"  (p.  115) 
that  it  is  so.  He  probably  did  die  poor,  but  Professor  Bemis 
stands  at  a  respectable  distance  from  intimate  knowledge  of 
this  matter.  There  remains  the  fact  that  the  great  bulk  of 
this  book  simply  recounts  what  has  already  appeared  in 
English.  This  reviewer  is  not  enlightened  to  reread  Howard 
Cline's  (The  United  States  and  Mexico,  Cambridge,  1953) 
educated  sneers  at  Wilsonian  idealism  in  paraphrased  form 
in  the  last  chapter.  There  are  citations  of  several  Masters' 
theses  written  at  Mexico  City  College.  Their  content,  how- 
ever, has  apparently  not  been  utilized ;  the  footnotes  merely 
announce  their  existence. 

Except  for  the  reappraisal  of  Huerta's  character,  which 
might  have  been  done  in  one-tenth  the  space,  this  work  merely 
rearranges  the  topsoil  of  the  Mexican  Revolution  in  an  un- 
convincing pattern.  The  authors  have  embarked  upon  a 
course  without  the  necessary  ballast. 
University  of  New  Mexico  TROY  S.  FLOYD 

The  Gila  Trail:  The  Texas  Argonauts  and  the  California 
Gold  Rush.  By  Benjamin  Butler  Harris.  Edited  and  an- 
notated by  Richard  H.  Dillon.  (American  Exploration  and 
Travel  Series,  Volume  31.)  Norman:  University  of  Okla- 
homa Press,  1960.  Pp.  ix,  175.  Map,  illustrations,  notes, 
appendix,  bibliographical  note  and  index.  $4.00. 

The  editor  contends  that  Benjamin  Butler  Harris's  remi- 
niscence of  his  experience  on  the  Gila  Trail  and  in  the  Cali- 
fornia gold  fields  is  worthy  of  publication  on  the  basis  of 
interest,  color,  readability,  and  new  information  added  to  the 
meager  knowledge  available  concerning  the  experiences  of 
gold  seekers  over  the  Gila  route.  The  editor  is  correct  in  his 
contention.  Harris,  a  practicing  attorney,  was  well  educated, 
an  intelligent  observer,  a  humorist  worthy  of  note  and  a 
writer  of  ability.  His  account  is  well  worth  the  attention  of 
readers  who  desire  to  be  entertained  as  well  as  those  who 
seek  historical  information. 


BOOK  REVIEWS  251 

Harris  left  Panola  County,  Texas,  on  March  25,  1849,  to 
join  the  party  of  Isaac  H.  Duval  who  was  in  charge  of  one  of 
the  earliest  groups  from  Texas  to  travel  to  the  California 
gold  fields.  The  party  journeyed  to  El  Paso  and  then  looped 
southward  across  northern  Chihuahua  before  passing 
through  Tucson,  Yuma  and  Tejon  to  complete  their  journey 
at  Sonora  on  September  29,  1849. 

The  carefully  prepared  editorial  notes  generally  comple- 
ment the  narrative;  however,  two  important  points  should 
be  clarified.  Harris  tells  (114-119)  an  interesting  and  an 
amusing  account  of  acquiring  a  turpentine  topknot  while 
sleeping  under  a  resinous  pine  tree.  The  pound  ball  of  tur- 
pentine clung  annoyingly  to  his  hair  for  days  because  he 
could  not  find  scissors  to  cut  it  away.  "Then  bowie  and  pocket 
knives  were  tried  but  their  rough  edges  proved  too  tedious 
and  painful  (114)."  He  even  moved  to  another  camp  before 
he  found  a  pair  of  scissors. 

The  editor  should  have  recognized  this  as  a  good  story 
and  nothing  more.  On  the  frontier,  a  man's  life  could  depend 
on  a  sharp  knife  and  in  an  environment  where  it  was  not  un- 
known for  an  individual  to  amputate  one  of  his  own  limbs, 
it  is  hard  to  conceive  of  Harris  being  squeamish  about  having 
someone  cut  a  ball  of  pine  tar  out  of  his  hair  with  a  knife. 

Harris  says  (103),  "A  peculiarity  of  the  atmosphere  at 
this  season  was  its  magnifying  properties  under  certain  con- 
ditions and  situations."  The  editor  states  (note  113),  "Per- 
haps this  will  explain  (even  excuse)  the  tendency  of  Cali- 
fornians  ...  to  exaggerate."  The  editor  is  naive  in  not  rec- 
ognizing exaggeration  to  be  a  more  fundamental  character- 
istic than  something  induced  by  a  peculiarity  of  the  atmos- 
phere and  is  lax  in  not  pointing  out  specific  instances  of  ex- 
exaggeration. 

That  Chief  Gomez  (110)  had  two  thousand  warriors  is 
certainly  an  overstatement.  The  footnote  (4)  implies  that 
this  number  may  have  been  two  hundred,  but  it  is  not  clear. 
A  war  party  of  four  hundred  Apaches  (67,  69)  was  possible. 
The  editor  should  have  questioned  (79,  note  72)  that  "More 
than  once  [Tucson]  has  been  invested  by  from  one  to  two 
thousand  Indians  .  ." 


252  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

The  editors  Foreword  and  Dramatis  Personse  might  have 
been  more  carefully  presented.  The  statement  that  the  "Soon- 
ers"  of  the  California  Gold  Rush  (ix)  were  Texans  should 
have  been  more  substantially  supported.  This  contention  is 
contradicted  by  the  statement  (3)  that  "Their  companions 
on  the  trail  were  simple,  restless  and  rootless  men  from  all 
corners  and  strata  of  North  America."  The  reader  is  left  to 
wonder  if  they  became  Texans  by  simply  passing  through 
Texas.  The  statement  that  Harris's  companions  were  simple, 
restless  or  rootless  is  contradicted  by  the  editor's  admission 
(14)  that  little  is  known  about  the  rest  of  the  Duval  party. 

"At  this,  I  laid  from  my  belt  by  two  duelling  pistols  .  .  ." 
(107)  should  read  my  instead  of  by.  Damned  (29,  note  4) 
should  be  dammed  since  it  refers  to  impounding  a  body  of 
water  rather  than  dooming  to  everlasting  punishment. 
Albuquerque,  N.  M.  VICTOR  WESTPHALL 

End  of  Track.  By  James  H.  Kyner  as  told  to  Hawthorne 
Daniel.  Lincoln :  University  of  Nebraska  Press,  1960.  Pp. 
280.  Notes.  $1.60. 

The  University  of  Nebraska  Press,  launching  a  new  series 
of  paper  bound  volumes  called  Bison  Books,  has  wisely 
chosen  to  reprint  this  autobiography,  originally  issued  in 
1937  by  the  Caxton  Printers.  The  present  edition,  well  made, 
sets  an  excellent  physical  standard  for  the  volumes  to  come. 
The  book  itself  is  absorbing  reading.  It  begins  with  Kyner's 
youth  as  the  son  of  a  village  innkeeper  in  Ohio,  depicting  an 
attractive  kind  of  rural  life  now  long  vanished  from  America. 
His  idyllic  situation  was  shattered  by  the  Civil  War,  in  which 
he  served  as  a  young  volunteer.  His  account  of  how  he  fought 
and  was  wounded  in  the  Battle  of  Shiloh  vividly  shows  just 
what  must  have  happened  to  many  a  simple  rural  lad  in  the 
early  clashes  of  the  conflict.  After  the  war  Kyner  farmed,  was 
in  the  insurance  business  and  eventually  won  a  seat  in  the 
Nebraska  legislature,  where  for  four  years  he  so  successfully 
blocked  anti-railroad  legislation  that  the  Union  Pacific 
abruptly,  unexpectedly  rewarded  him  with  a  contract  to 
build  a  twenty-five  mile  branch  line  within  the  state.  He  had 


BOOK  REVIEWS  253 

no  experience  or  capital,  but  managed  to  execute  the  task 
successfully  and  make  a  profit  of  $10,000.  He  went  on  to  build 
or  refurbish  many  miles  of  track  in  Idaho,  Colorado,  Wyo- 
ming, Iowa  and  Ohio.  Bankrupted  in  the  panic  of  1893,  he 
started  again  with  nothing  and  made  enough  to  retire  from 
railroading  in  1901  with  a  comfortable  fortune. 

Kyner's  account  of  his  experiences  as  a  railroad  contrac- 
tor is  unique;  there  is  no  comparable  document.  He  relates 
the  exciting  things,  the  tribulations  and  the  general  tech- 
niques in  pages  interesting  for  the  general  reader  but  frus- 
trating to  the  specialist  eager  for  the  details  which  only  such 
an  expert  as  he  could  have  supplied.  In  sweeping  strokes  he 
depicts  the  era  when  railroads  pioneered  through  the  unset- 
tled west,  when  men  of  pragmatic  enterprise  achieved  great 
works  and  secured  large  fortunes.  Most  of  the  areas  where 
Kyner  built  were  sparsely  populated,  lawless  and  in  many 
ways  uncivilized.  As  serious  history,  this  autobiography  of  a 
railroad  frontiersman  is  much  better  in  setting  the  general 
scene  than  giving  the  details;  as  interesting  reading,  it  is 
superior. 
University  of  Idaho  WILLIAM  S.  GREEVER 

The  Maxwell  Land  Grant.  By  Jim  Berry  Pearson.  Norman : 
University  of  Oklahoma  Press,  1961.  Pp.  xiv,  305.  $5.00. 

The  many  histories  of  the  famous  Maxwell  Land  Grant 
have  usually  stressed  the  way  in  which  Carlos  Beaubien  and 
Guadalupe  Miranda,  its  original  recipients,  managed  to  ac- 
quire such  a  huge  two  million  acre  tract  from  Governor 
Armijo  in  1843.  Then  they  treat  the  lordly  manner  in  which 
Lucien  B.  Maxwell,  who  became  the  Grant's  owner  for  a 
time,  lived  on  his  vast  estate  and  dispensed  lavish  frontier 
hospitality  to  all  comers.  After  Maxwell  agreed  to  sell  the 
property  in  1869  to  a  syndicate  of  Colorado  and  British  pro- 
moters backed  by  Dutch  capital,  the  Grant's  history  is  usually 
depicted  as  a  saga  of  sophisticated  financial  chicanery  prac- 
ticed by  the  Maxwell  Land  Grant  and  Railroad  Company  as 
they  promoted  fraudulent  stock  sales  abroad  and  exploited 
the  company  property  at  home.  This  robber-baron,  big- 


254  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

business  aspect  of  the  Grant's  history  has  been  reinforced 
by  many  colorful  accounts  of  the  violent  and  often  tragic 
war  between  settlers  who  felt  the  Grant  was  public  domain 
and  the  Company  who  insisted — sometimes  at  gunpoint — 
that  it  was  not. 

All  these  standard  items  and  many  more  appear  in  Dr. 
Jim  Berry  Pearson's  fact-studded  and  often  entertaining 
book.  But  this  study  is  far  more  than  a  rehash  of  a  familiar 
story.  Intrigued  by  placer  mining  scars  on  the  side  of  Baldy 
Mountain  and  curious  about  the  few  remaining  buildings 
of  the  once  prosperous  mining  community  of  Elizabethtown, 
the  author  at  first  sought  to  uncover  the  mining  history  of 
Colfax  County.  But  this  search  led  him  into  a  study  of  the 
Maxwell  Company  itself  since  it  owned  the  region  and  many 
of  its  enterprises  centered  on  mining.  What  has  emerged  is 
an  unusually  detailed  history  of  the  Company  from  its  be- 
ginnings down  to  the  present  decade,  in  essense  a  study  of 
large-scale  corporate  endeavor  on  the  frontier.  Dr.  Pearson's 
fresh  version  is  all  the  more  valuable  since  he  had  access  to 
the  Company  records  which  have  been  lying  undisturbed  in 
the  vault  of  the  First  National  Bank  of  Raton  for  some  years. 
Consisting  of  account  books,  minutes  of  meetings,  annual 
reports,  scrapbooks  and  letters,  these  sources — supplemented 
by  local  newspapers — enabled  Dr.  Pearson  to  make  a  thor- 
ough economic  case  study  of  the  Company  somewhat  on  the 
order  of  Herbert  O.  Brayer's  monumental  history  of  William 
Blackmore's  western  enterprises.  The  Maxwell  Land  Grant 
also  represents  another  sure  step  in  the  direction  of  recover- 
ing New  Mexico's  past  economic  history,  a  task  in  which 
Dean  William  J.  Parish,  Max  Moorhead,  and  Brayer  have 
already  pioneered. 

Dr.  Pearson's  account  is  far  from  a  straight  business 
history,  however,  for  he  provides  a  readable  but  intelligent 
summary  of  Lucien  Maxwell's  career,  a  history  of  the  brief- 
lived  but  roaring  community  of  Elizabethtown,  and  a  de- 
tailed rendition  of  the  deadly  activities  of  gunmen  like  "Wall" 
Henderson  and  Clay  Allison,  as  well  as  of  crusaders  like  the 
rambunctious  Reverend  0.  P.  McMains.  Nevertheless  his 
chief  contributions  lie  in  a  coverage  of  mining  and  Company 


BOOK  REVIEWS  255 

history.  He  establishes  the  importance  of  mining  in  fostering 
the  Grant's  development  even  though  the  gold  extracted  sel- 
dom paid  large  sums.  Quite  the  reverse,  the  cost  of  mining 
it  often  bankrupted  its  investors.  At  the  same  time  he  uses 
facts  and  figures  to  cut  the  legendary  stories  about  the  Aztec 
and  Montezuma  mines  down  to  size.  In  discussing  the  Com- 
pany's other  wide-ranging  enterprises  on  the  Grant — a  coal 
and  coke  company,  irrigation  projects,  a  cement  factory, 
ranching  and  railroad  building — he  finds  that  these  efforts 
also  met  with  relatively  limited  success. 

Such  failures  are  explained  in  large  part  by  the  unending 
struggle  lasting  to  1887,  to  secure  valid  title  to  the  Grant, 
to  eject  squatters,  and  to  find  capital.  But  the  real  cause  of 
failure  lay  in  the  Company  itself  which  was  torn  by  warring 
factions  among  the  directors,  feuds  between  the  British  pro- 
moters and  the  Dutch  mortgage  holders,  and  a  lack  of  under- 
standing between  the  local  managers  of  the  property  and  its 
absentee  owners.  And  lastly,  the  presence  of  speculators  who 
periodically  raided  the  Company's  assets  resulted  in  a  crush- 
ing bonded  indebtedness  and  receivership.  The  author  finds 
this  struggle  continuing  right  into  the  twentieth  century  until 
the  Amsterdam  bondholders  finally  assumed  full  control  of 
the  property. 

By  carefully  avoiding  moral  judgments  and  by  the  use  of 
a  historical  perspective  which  0.  P.  McMains  and  his  anti- 
Grant  settlers  could  never  have  acquired,  Dr.  Pearson  is  able 
to  conclude  his  study  on  a  somewhat  positive  note : 

Despite  .  .  .  constant  dissension  the  land  grant  company 
initiated  projects  for  developing  the  area's  resources.  Its  offi- 
cials sought  to  bring  in  railroads,  mined  and  marketed  coal, 
operated  a  cement  factory,  constructed  two  expensive  irriga- 
tion projects,  experimented  with  various  crops,  mined  gold  and 
silver,  ran  herds  of  cattle,  leased  rich  stands  of  timber,  and 
sold  off  the  property  in  both  large  and  small  tracts. 

The  Maxwell  Land  Grant  is  so  generally  thorough  and 
objective  in  its  coverage  that  only  one  major  omission  de- 
serves comment.  Every  observer  in  nineteenth  century  New 
Mexico  noted  that  little  could  be  done  in  the  territory  with- 


256  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

out  the  sanction  or  collaboration  of  the  clique  of  lawyers  and 
businessmen  called  the  Santa  Fe  Ring.  Yet  the  role  of  the 
Ring  in  Colfax  County  politics  and  in  the  Company's  history 
is  never  made  clear  in  this  book.  If  the  relations  of  Probate 
Judge  Dr.  R.  H.  Longwill,  Attorney  M.  W.  Mills,  and  Frank 
Springer  with  the  Ring  could  be  spelled  out,  the  real  reason 
for  attaching  Colfax  County  to  Taos  during  Governor  Ax- 
tell's  administration  might  be  less  obscure  than  it  appears 
here.  It  rather  looks  as  if  the  Company  managers  were  fight- 
ing Tom  Catron  and  the  Ring  just  then  and  the  attachment 
was  a  legal  method  to  embarrass  or  even  seize  the  Company. 
The  role  of  Judge  L.  B.  Prince  and  several  others  in  rendering 
certain  favorable  decisions  for  the  Company  is  not  treated ; 
and  finally,  the  reason  for  choosing  W.  T.  Thornton,  law 
partner  to  Catron,  as  receiver  for  the  Company  in  1880 
might  have  been  explored.  Such  inclusions  would  have  given 
better  focus  to  the  Grant's  role  in  New  Mexican  political 
history. 

On  the  level  of  minor  criticism  this  reviewer  unhappily 
found  several  instances  of  poor  proof  reading.  Dr.  R.  H. 
Longwill,  or  so  spelled  in  Twitchell,  becomes  Longwell  in  this 
volume.  Melvin  W.  Mills  also  appears  as  Marvin  W.  Mills, 
while  Wilson  Waddingham  is  on  one  occasion  "Waddington" 
and  George  M.  Pullman  is  "George  H."  These  errors  and  the 
fact  that  the  University  of  Oklahoma  Press  omitted  pages 
99  to  115  in  this  reviewer's  copy  mar  a  clear,  readable,  thor- 
oughly researched  and  documented  history  of  the  Maxwell 
Land  Grant,  its  owners,  enterprises,  and  opponents.  The 
book  is  well  illustrated  with  many  photographs  of  Grant 
figures  and  scenes. 

Yale  University  HOWARD  R.  LAMAR 


^Mexico 


3 


Historical  l^eview 


Palace  of  the  Governors,  Santa  Fe      _  ..  c 


October,  1961 


Editors 
FRANK  D.  REEVE  PAUL  A.  F.  WALTER 

Associates 

PERCY  M.  BALDWIN  GEORGE  P.  HAMMOND 

FRANCE  V.  SCHOLES  ELEANOR  B.  ADAMS 

BRUCE  T.  ELLIS 

VOL.  XXXVI  OCTOBER,  1961  No.  4 


CONTENTS 

Page 

Paul  "Flying  Eagle"  Goodbear 

Luella  Thornburgh 257 

The  Chouteau-Demun  Expedition  To  New  Mexico,  1815-17 

George  S.  Ulibarri 263 

Frank  Bond :  Gentleman  Sheepherder  of  Northern  New  Mexico, 
1883-1915  (continued) 
Frank  H.  Grubbs 274 

Notes  and  Documents 346 

Book  Reviews  349 


THE  NEW  MEXICO  HISTORICAL  REVIEW  is  published  jointly  by  the 
Historical  Society  of  New  Mexico  and  The  University  of  New  Mexico. 
Subscription  to  the  REVIEW  is  by  membership  in  the  Society — open  to  all. 
Dues,  including  subscription,  $5.00  annually,  in  advance.  Single  num- 
bers, except  a  few  which  have  become  scarce,  are  $1.00  each.  For  further 
information  regarding  back  files  and  other  publications  available,  see 
back  cover. 

Membership  dues  and  other  business  communications  should  be  ad- 
dressed to  the  Historical  Society  of  New  Mexico,  Box  1727,  Santa  Fe, 
N.  M.  Manuscripts  and  editorial  correspondence  should  be  addressed 
to  Prof.  Frank  D.  Reeve,  The  University  of  New  Mexico,  Albuquerque, 
N.  M. 

Entered  as  second-class  matter  at  Santa  Fe,  New  Mexico 
PRINTED  AT  THE  UNIVERSITY  OF  NEW  MEXICO,  ALBUQUERQUE 


PAUL "FLYING  EAGLE" GOODBEAR 


NEW   MEXICO    HISTORICAL 
REVIEW 

VOL.  XXXVI  OCTOBER,  1961  No.  4 

PAUL  "FLYING  EAGLE"  GOODBEAR 

£?/LUELLATHORNBURGH  * 

ON  June  26,  1954,  in  a  hospital  in  Chicago,  a  full-blood 
Cheyenne  Indian  artist  and  writer  passed  away,  leaving 
his  widow  and  two  children,  three  and  five  years  old — alone 
to  review  his  successes.  His  family  was  in  Thoreau,  New  Mex- 
ico, at  the  time,  waiting  for  the  arrival  of  husband  and  father. 
His  death  cut  off  the  fine  works  of  Paul  "Flying  Eagle"  Good- 
bear,  a  descendant  of  Warring  Cheyennes  during  the  1850's 
through  the  year  1878.  Paul  Goodbear  was  the  grandson  of 
Chief  Turkey  Legs,  the  great  great  grandson  of  Chief  Whirl- 
wind and  the  great  grandson  of  Chief  Starr  of  Oklahoma. 

His  contribution  to  New  Mexico  history  came  with  the 
restoration  of  prehistoric  murals  at  Coronado  Monument 
Museum  near  Bernalillo,  and  the  techniques  he  used  were 
akin  to  those  of  the  Greeks  and  Italian  masters.  In  this  work, 
he  was  necessarily  forced  to  paint  on  fresh  plaster.  His  pa- 
tience and  understanding  of  his  duty  as  a  contractor  for  the 
job  as  well  as  his  fidelity  to  his  own  style  of  painting  is 
amazing,  and  the  finished  product  is  preserved  for  future 
generations. 

Paul  Goodbear  was  born  near  Fay,  Oklahoma,  where 
Cheyennes  lived  on  disconnected  farms  instead  of  banded  to- 
gether. He  was  a  gentle  young  man,  always  ready  to  interpret 
the  old  stories  of  the  tribe ;  however,  he  did  know  that  Turkey 
Legs  was  in  the  battle  of  the  Big  Horn — the  one  at  which  Cus- 
ter  and  his  men  fell  and  died.  An  unidentified  newspaper 
write-up  of  Paul  "Flying  Eagle"  Goodbear  quotes  much  from 

*  P.O.  Box  36,  Sandoval,  N.  M. 

257 


258  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

the  World  Book  about  the  ancestors  of  Paul.  The  Cheyennes 
"became  the  most  skillful  and  daring  riders  of  the  Plains. 
....  They  have  always  been  a  strong,  brave  people  who  held 
women  in  high  regard." 

In  this  atmosphere  of  tribal  stories,  Paul  learned  the 
dances,  then  became  interested  in  expressing  the  movement 
and  color  of  the  living  figures  of  the  ceremonial  participants. 
Furthermore,  he  became  an  educator  of  Indians  of  all  tribes 
and  injected  his  personality  into  manuscripts  written  about 
them. 

Paul's  mother  was  a  bead  worker  and  skilled  in  her  art, 
and  here  again  is  background  for  his  gentility  and  under- 
standing of  all  peoples.  He  married  a  Choctaw,  described  as 
"small  and  vivacious,"  who  was  also  interested  in  the  teach- 
ings of  the  antecedents  on  both  sides.  On  occasion,  Mrs.  Good- 
bear  reminded  her  husband  in  a  fond  manner  that  while  his 
people  were  roaming  the  plains,  her  people  were  being  called 
one  of  the  "Five  Civilized  Tribes  ..."  and  had  begun  to 
adopt  log  houses  for  abodes.  She  is  a  graduate  of  Southeast 
State  College  at  Durant,  Oklahoma,  and  her  influence  on  her 
husband's  short-lived  future  was  tremendous. 

World  War  II  took  Paul  away  from  his  dancing,  his  paint- 
ings, his  writing  and  in  general  threw  him  again  into  the 
life  of  a  "Warring  Cheyenne."  He  was  wounded  twice  in  the 
Normandy  Landing  and  in  the  Battle  of  the  Bulge.  Officially, 
his  name  of  "Flying  Eagle" — an  Indian  tag — was  given  to 
him  after  his  return  from  his  services  with  the  United  States. 
Not  having  enough  to  give  to  his  country,  he  went  to  Japan  as 
a  staff  artist  with  three  American  daily  newspapers  and  a 
comic  strip  was  born,  entitled  "Chief  Ugh."  Deep  rooted  hu- 
mor poured  from  his  pen.  This  proves  the  kinship  of  the 
pioneer  and  the  living  Indian  tribe  which,  if  founded  in  time, 
could  have  averted  wars,  costly  to  man  and  beast  alike. 

A  painting  of  Cheyenne  Buffalo  Dancer,  full  of  action  and 
graceful  lines  was  sold  at  the  Capper  Crippled  Childrens  art 

auction  in in  the  year .  Paul,  at  this 

time,  had  already  exhibited  at  the  Metropolitan  in  New  York, 
at  the  Syracuse  Museum  of  Fine  Arts  at  Philbrook  Museum 
and  in  the  Santa  Fe  Art  Gallery.  Another  painting,  Cheyenne 


DRAWING  BY  PAUL  GOODBEAR 


PAUL  "FLYING  EAGLE"  GOODBEAR         259 

War  Dance,  was  also  donated  by  Paul  "Flying  Eagle"  Good- 
bear  for  private  sale,  with  the  proceeds  designated  for  the 
crippled  children's  fund. 

While  contributing  to  art  collections  in  New  Mexico 
(paintings  by  Goodbear  can  be  seen  at  the  Hilton  Hotel  in  Al- 
buquerque) ,  he  had  his  heart  in  the  education  of  the  Indian 
tribes,  and  made  some  good  comparisons  on  the  methods  of 
teaching  in  public  schools  of  tribal  Indians  and  teachings  in 
white  schools.  His  sense  of  competition  was  quite  cast  aside  in 
favor  of  his  sense  of  consideration  for  fellow  man  and  obedi- 
ence to  human  rights.  This  is  why  he  championed,  always, 
the  Indian  artist's  right  to  retain  his  own  expression  and 
reflect  his  heritage. 

Paul  Goodbear's  children  live  with  their  mother  who  still 
teaches  in  Indian  Schools — Indian  Mission  Schools —  and 
speaks  of  Paul  with  great  respect  and  admiration  for  his 
works,  the  ones  his  untimely  death  left  undone.  She  is  re- 
married, and  her  two  children  are  living  the  happy,  educa- 
tional life  they  embarked  upon.  The  history  of  Paul  Good- 
bear's  contribution  to  New  Mexico  history  should  be  recorded, 
for  it  was  in  the  state  of  New  Mexico  where  he  left  most  of 
his  estate,  that  of  his  paintings  and  the  new  generation  he 
launched. 

CHEYENNE  SUN  DANCE 

By  PAUL  FLYING  EAGLE  GOODBEAR 

It  was  early  morning  and  the  camp  was  already  wide 
awake.  This  was  the  fourth  day  of  preparation  and  the  sun 
dance  was  about  to  begin.  The  Cheyennes  came  out  of  their 
teepees  to  watch  for  the  parade  of  the  clans.  It  was  the  clans 
duty  to  secure  the  poles  for  the  sun  lodge  and  they  would  soon 
be  coming.  Then  came  a  shout  from  the  far  side  of  the  camp 
— Some  one  had  spied  them  approaching  on  horseback. 

The  dog  soldier  clan  came  to  a  halt.  It  was  at  the  edge  of 
the  huge  camp.  They  regrouped  into  a  formation  of  four 
abreast,  much  like  soldiers  on  parade.  Indeed,  some  of  them 
were  old  warriors.  They  had  paraded  like  this  many  times 


260  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

before.  In  olden  days  they  had  gone  on  the  war  path.  They 
started  slowly  around  the  outer  side  of  the  camp.  First  came 
the  old  war  chiefs  all  decked  out  in  war  bonnets.  They  wore 
breach  cloths  of  bright  colors,  white  beaded  moccasins,  and 
some  had  made  willow  wreath  necklaces  for  their  ponies. 
Scalps  hung  from  lances  that  the  proud  chiefs  had  taken  in 
battle.  They  were  indeed  a  proud  lot.  Behind  them  rode  the 
war  dancers.  They  were  mostly  younger  men.  Dyed  porcu- 
pine headdresses  shimmered  in  the  sun  like  Roman  plumes. 
All  wore  exquisite  beaded  vests,  gauntlets,  and  bells  around 
their  ankles  jingled  as  they  rode  along.  Next  came  the  medi- 
cine men  and  buffalo  dancers.  Huge  buffalo  headdresses 
trimmed  with  eagle  feathers  made  them  look  top  heavy,  which 
only  added  to  their  already  majestic  bearing. 

As  the  clan  advanced  they  began  to  sing  an  old  war  song. 
Men  who  watched  shouted  war  whoops  and  women  sang  or 
cried.  Memories  were  very  real  and  near  to  some  of  them.  It 
was  indeed  an  inspiring  sight,  though  a  little  sad  I  thought. 
The  glory  was  a  thing  of  the  past  and  only  memories  re- 
mained. But  what  glorious  memories  these  were  I  was  to  see 
for  the  next  three  days  of  the  sun  dance. 

That  evening  the  Elk  Soldiers,  the  Black  Arrows  and  the 
Chief  Clan  performed  the  opening  dance  in  the  sun  lodge.  It 
was  soon  filled  with  men,  women,  and  horses.  The  loud  sing- 
ing, war  whoops,  and  discharging  of  old  Winchesters  filled 
the  air  with  dramatic  noises.  After  a  special  dance  the  horses 
were  given  away  to  friends.  Men  lead  the  horses  away  and 
women  struggled  along  behind  them  loaded  down  with  gifts. 

Now  it  was  time  for  the  sun  dance  to  begin.  The  most 
sacred  of  all  the  Cheyenne  ceremonials,  the  most  elaborate, 
and  the  most  cruel.  Cruel  from  the  stand  point  of  the  hunger 
and  thirst  involved.  The  dancers  must  dance  for  three  days 
and  nights  without  food  or  drink.  At  night  they  get  very  little 
sleep. 

The  drums  began  to  sound  a  vibrating  rhythm  of  accent 
and  unaccented  time.  A  high-pitched  falsetto  voice  started 
each  long  solo.  Then  the  other  singers  would  join  in  unison. 
Singers  were  divided  into  groups  so  that  they  could  sing  in 
relay  fashion,  day  and  night,  without  a  break. 


PAUL  "FLYING  EAGLE"  GOODBEAR         261 

The  sundancers  stood  up.  Each  was  directed  by  a  medi- 
cine man.  Another  man  behind  him  guided  his  arms.  He 
swung  them  toward  the  eagles  nest  on  the  center  pole  at  the 
right  instant.  The  eagle  bone  whistles  between  their  lips  were 
blown  in  unison  and  to  the  beat  of  the  drum.  This  whistle,  as 
the  dancers  found  out  later,  would  dry  their  throats  to  in- 
crease their  thirst.  Each  man  was  painted  with  symbolic  de- 
signs down  to  the  waist.  He  wore  a  blanket  wrapped  around 
his  waist  like  a  skirt.  A  willow  wreath  was  on  his  head.  Green 
willow  streamers  dangled  from  his  wrists.  In  one  hand  he 
held  an  eagle  feather  fan  and  four  sacred  arrows  in  the  other. 

They  danced  in  an  up  and  down  motion  not  moving  from 
the  spot.  At  first  I  thought  this  was  monotonous.  But  as  the 
days  went  on  it  grew  on  me  and  I  found  myself  singing  along 
with  the  rest.  Several  times  I  shouted  encouragement  to  a 
faltering  dancer.  Once  in  a  while  an  exhausted  dancer  would 
fall  to  the  ground. 

The  medicine  men  watched  over  these  dancers  carefully. 
They  made  them  comfortable  on  their  buffalo  robes  and  mas- 
saged their  bodies.  Some  lay  in  semi-consciousness  most  of 
the  third  day  while  others  danced  on.  Some  leaned  on  willow 
staffs  to  support  their  lean,  starved  bodies.  They  swayed 
backward  and  forward  in  a  feeble  attempt  to  dance.  Others 
sat  and  stared  at  the  huge  piles  of  food  set  before  them  which 
they  were  forbidden  to  eat.  Any  one  else  might  eat,  but  not 
the  fasting  sun  dancers. 

This  last  day,  late  in  the  afternoon,  the  sun  stood  still. 
That  is,  it  seemed  so  to  the  dancers.  They  would,  now  and 
then,  look  to  see  how  far  the  sun  had  progressed  since  last 
they  looked.  It  crept  so  slowly  across  the  sky  and  became  so 
hot.  The  thirst,  the  hunger,  and  delirious  delusions  increased 
with  the  heat.  Surely  this  day  would  never  end,  and  all  of 
them  would  slowly  die.  But  they  also  knew  that  the  sun  must 
set  as  it  always  had  and  with  it  would  come  the  end  of  the 
dance.  Then  they  could  eat  and  drink  again,  their  sacrifice 
having  been  made.  But  right  now  the  time  stood  still. 

As  if  this  were  not  torture  enough,  the  dancers  were  lined 
up.  They  were  to  run  out  of  the  lodge,  to  an  arrow  stuck  in 
the  ground,  around  the  arrow  and  back  to  the  lodge  again. 


262  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Once  at  each  cardinal  point  this  must  be  done.  As  weakened 
as  they  were,  they  formed  a  line.  This  was  their  final  test  of 
endurance  and  they  could  not  falter  now.  The  signal  was 
given  and  the  dancers  rushed  forward,  more  stumbling  than 
running.  Some  of  them  fell,  but  were  helped  to  their  feet  and 
allowed  to  continue.  Finally  all  finished  the  run  and  another 
sun  dance  was  over.  Over  except  for  the  memories  that  would 
remain  for  years  to  come.  Something  to  tell  their  grand- 
children. Their  faith  and  trust  in  their  maker  had  been 
proven.  Their  belief  had  been  strong  enough  to  carry  them 
through  to  the  final  completion  of  the  sun  dance. 

"Well,  how  was  it?"  I  asked  a  dancer  walking  along  to  his 
teepee. 

"It  was  pretty  tough.  I  didn't  think  I'd  last  till  it  rained 
last  night  and  cooled  everything  off.  Then  I  knew  that  God 
had  seen  us  and  taken  pity  on  us.  We  all  made  it.  Now  it  is 
over  and  it  is  good." 

This  was  my  father  talking.  He  had  just  taken  part  in  the 
sun  dance  the  Cheyenne  tribe  had  in  1950. 


PIKE'S  MAP 

This  map  is  a  correct  copy  of  Capt.  Pike's  map.  All  the  alterations 
&  additions  which  I  have  thought  necessary  and  the  Spanish  names  of 
rivers  &c  are  made  with  red  ink.  Perhaps  it  will  not  be  improper  to 
observe  that  Rio  del  Norte  is  not  correctly  laid  down  on  this  map,  as 
said  river,  from  a  little  above  Taos,  runs  almost  a  due  west  course,  fol- 
lowing the  foot  of  the  mountains  (which  at  Taos  form  a  right  angle) 
till  a  little  below  the  village  of  La  Canada,  from  whence  it  takes  its 
course  again  to  the  South. 

The  place  marked  thus  []  on  the  river  Cuerno  Verde  (or  Green 
Home)  is  where  we  have  been  taken  by  the  Spaniards. 

Rio  Sn.  Carlos  &  its  branch,  Cuerno  Verde,  altogether  left  out  on 
Pike's  map.  Serro  Huerfano,  or  Orphan  Mound  is  an  isolated  rocky 
mound  about  150  feet  high  from  which  the  river  has  derived  its  name. 
The  pass  of  La  Sangre  de  Christo  is  the  pass  most  generally  used  by  the 
Spaniards  on  their  trading  expeditions  on  the  Arkansas.  No  Island  in 
the  Rio  del  Norte,  as  put  down  in  Pike's  map,  he  having  mistaken  the 
outlet  of  large  swamps  into  the  river  for  a  channel  of  said  river  round 
the  supposed  Island.  (Signed)  Julius  De  Mun. 


Map  of  Northern  New  Mexico 

This  is  a  copy  of  the  map  submitted  to  the  Claims  Com- 
mission by  Julius  Demun  as  proof  that  his  party  was  "well 
within  the  recognized  boundaries  of  the  United  States" 
when  arrested  by  the  Spaniards.  On  the  lower  right  hand 
corner  of  the  map  are  listed  the  rivers  whose  names  he  cor- 
rected. 

The  right  hand  margin  on  the  original  map  is  frayed 
and  several  words  and  parts  of  words  are  now  missing.  A 
complete  copy  of  Demun's  "Notes"  including  the  missing 
words  is  eiven  in  Notes  and  Documents. 


THE  CHOUTEAU-DEMUN  EXPEDITION 
TO  NEW  MEXICO,  1815-17 

By  GEORGE  S.  ULIBARRI* 


IN  1815  two  enterprising  Frenchmen  from  St.  Louis,  Mis- 
souri, fitted  out  an  expedition  to  trade  with  the  Indians 
along  the  headwaters  of  the  Arkansas  River  within  the 
boundaries  of  present  day  Colorado.  The  trading  party  was 
arrested  in  1817  by  Spanish  colonial  authorities  of  New  Mex- 
ico and  taken  to  Santa  Fe  where  they  were  tried,  imprisoned, 
and  their  property  confiscated.  After  their  release,  the  trad- 
ers returned  to  St.  Louis  and  began  a  legal  battle  which  lasted 
over  30  years  and  involved  presenting  their  claim  for  illegal 
property  seizure  to  three  different  claims  commissions  before 
a  final  decision  was  rendered. 

The  leaders  of  the  expedition  were  Auguste  P.  Chouteau 
and  Julius  Demun,  former  French  citizens  who  had  but  re- 
cently joined  the  great  American  melting  pot.  Both  were 
members  of  well-known  families  in  the  Missouri  Territory. 
Auguste  P.  Chouteau  was  born  in  St.  Louis  and  had  acquired 
American  citizenship  under  Article  III  of  the  treaty  for  the 
purchase  of  Louisiana.  He  was  a  nephew  of  Auguste  Chou- 
teau, one  of  the  founders  of  St.  Louis.  Members  of  the  Chou- 
teau family  were  leaders  of  the  fur  trade  in  the  early  part  of 
the  19th  century,  their  operations  extending  from  the  Mis- 
souri Territory  to  the  headwaters  of  the  Platte,  the  Arkan- 
sas, and  the  Rio  Grande.1  Julius  Demun,  who  was  born  on  the 
island  of  Santo  Domingo,  emigrated  to  the  United  States  at 
the  time  of  the  "great  massacre."  He  lived  in  Delaware  and 
Pennsylvania  before  moving  to  Ste.  Genevieve,  Missouri,  and 
from  there  went  to  St.  Louis  in  1810.2  His  brother,  Count 

*  3960  Penna.  Ave.,  SE.,  Washington  20,  B.C. 

1.  Ralph   Emerson   Twitchell,   The  Leading  Facts  of  New  Mexican  History,   Vol. 
II,  p.  99. 

2.  Document  No.  7,  Claim  No.  37,  U.S.  Board  of  Commissioners,  1849-51,  Records  of 
Boundary  and  Claims  Commissions  and  Arbitrations,  National  Archives,  Record  Group 
76.  Hereafter  records  in  the  National  Archives  are  indicated  by  the  symbol  NA,  fol- 
lowed by  the  record  group   (RG)   number. 

263 


264  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Louis  Demun,  was  a  well-known  figure  in  Washington  where 
he  served  as  Secretary  of  the  French  Legation.3 

In  1815  Auguste  P.  Chouteau  and  Julius  Demun  organ- 
ized a  large  trading  party  with  extensive  stores  of  merchan- 
dise, provisions,  munitions,  and  all  other  suitable  equipment 
for  a  trading  expedition  among  the  Indians.  They  obtained  a 
license  from  Governor  William  Clark  of  the  Missouri  Terri- 
tory before  leaving  St.  Louis  on  September  10, 1815.  The  trip 
to  the  headwaters  of  the  Arkansas  River  was  made  in  the 
company  of  a  trader  named  Phillibert  who  had  spent  the 
previous  year  in  the  Rocky  Mountain  country  and  had  re- 
turned to  Missouri  to  buy  supplies  with  which  to  trade  with 
the  Indians  for  horses  so  he  could  bring  in  his  supply  of  furs. 
Phillibert,  who  sold  his  entire  outfit  to  Chouteau  and  Demun, 
told  them  that  his  companions  would  be  waiting  at  the  Huer- 
fano  Creek,  but  when  they  arrived  at  their  destination  on 
December  8,  1815,  the  men  were  gone.  Friendly  Indians  in- 
formed Demun  that  Phillibert's  companions  had  waited  until 
their  supplies  were  almost  gone  before  deciding  to  go  to  New 
Mexico. 

Leaving  Chouteau  behind,  Demun  went  to  New  Mexico 
and  found  them  at  Taos,  where  the  men  had  been  well  treated. 
From  Taos,  Demun  decided  to  go  to  Santa  Fe  where  he  had 
an  interview  with  Governor  Alberto  Maynez.  Induced  by  the 
apparent  advantage  of  extending  their  operations  into  Span- 
ish territory,  Demun  tried  but  did  not  secure  permission  to 
trap  beaver  in  the  streams  of  northern  New  Mexico.  The 
Governor,  however,  promised  to  recommend  to  the  proper 
authorities  in  Chihuahua  that  such  permission  be  given.  At 
the  same  time  he  cautioned  Demun  to  restrict  his  party's  ac- 
tivities to  the  areas  north  of  the  Red  River.4  Demun  after  his 
interview  with  Governor  Maynez,  returned  to  Chouteau's 
camp  on  the  Huerfano  Creek,  and  shortly  afterwards,  ac- 
companied by  Phillibert  and  another  trapper,  returned  to  St. 
Louis.5 

3.  Thomas  H.  Benton  to  Secretary  of  State  Henry  Clay,  May  4,  1825,  Miscellaneous 
Letters,  General  Records  of  the  Department  of  State,  NA,  RG  69. 

4.  Document  No.  7,  Claim  No.  37,  U.S.  Board  of  Commissioners,  1849-61,  NA,  RG 
76. 

6.  During:  his  visit  to  Santa  Fe,  New  Mexico,  Demun  learned  that  James  Baird, 
Robert  McKnight,  Samuel  Chambers,  and  other  members  of  a  previous  trading  party 


THE   CHOUTEAU-DEMUN  EXPEDITION  265 

Demun  with  several  new  members  added  to  his  party,  left 
St.  Louis  on  July  15,  1816,  and  met  Chouteau,  who  had 
brought  a  shipment  of  furs,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Kansas  river. 
From  there,  the  two  leaders  with  a  party  of  about  45  trappers 
and  hunters  returned  to  the  headwaters  of  the  Arkansas 
River.  Part  of  the  group  went  to  the  Sangre  de  Cristo  Moun- 
tains while  Demun  started  for  Santa  Fe.  Before  arriving  at 
the  New  Mexican  capital,  he  learned  that  the  new  governor, 
Pedro  Maria  de  Allande,  was  extremely  suspicious  of  the 
activities  of  the  fur  traders.  In  fact,  Governor  Allande  or- 
dered Chouteau  to  get  out  of  Spanish  territory,  an  order  with 
which  they  complied  by  proceeding  to  the  headwaters  of  the 
Arkansas  where  they  trapped  and  hunted  during  the  fall  and 
winter.6  During  this  time  they  were  in  frequent  communica- 
tion with  New  Mexican  authorities.  Every  precaution  was 
taken  to  keep  the  party's  operations  within  the  recognized 
boundaries  of  the  United  States,  although  there  were  rumors 
to  the  contrary.  The  rumors  were  investigated  but  the  result 
proved  them  to  be  wholly  without  foundation.7 

Demun  was  planning  to  take  another  shipment  of  furs  to 
St.  Louis  when  his  plans  were  interrupted  by  the  arrival  of  a 
Spanish  military  force  under  Sergeant  Mariano  Bernal.  Gov- 
ernor Allande  had  given  Sergeant  Bernal  orders  to  arrest 
and  conduct  the  entire  party  to  Santa  Fe.  All  members  of 
the  party  who  were  present  were  arrested  on  May  24,  and  on 
June  1,  1817,  were  delivered  as  prisoners  to  the  Governor  in 
Santa  Fe,  where  they  were  tried  by  a  tribunal  made  up  of 
the  Governor  and  six  other  men.  Governor  Allande  felt  that 
the  traders  had  not  obeyed  his  orders  to  get  out  of  Spanish 
territory.  Demun  and  his  party  insisted  that  they  were  with- 
in the  recognized  boundaries  of  the  United  States,  engaged  in 
peaceful  activities  under  a  license  obtained  from  Governor 
Clark  of  Missouri.  The  Spanish  governor  was  not  convinced 
by  their  argument,  and  the  two  leaders  together  with  24  of 
their  companions  were  confined  48  days  in  the  old  jail  which 

were  being  forcibly  detained  in  New  Mexico  by  Spanish  authorities.  News  of  their  de- 
tention, which  Demun  brought  to  St.  Louis,  gladdened  the  hearts  of  friends  and  rela- 
tives who  had  feared  that  something  worse  than  imprisonment  had  befallen  the  un- 
fortunate traders. 

6.  Twitchell,  op.  cit.  p.  100. 

7.  Document  7,  Claim  No.  37,  U.S.  Board  of  Commissioners,  1849-51,  NA,  RG  76. 


266  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

stood  in  the  plaza  in  front  of  the  old  palace.  During  this  time 
they  were  dieted  in  a  very  coarse  and  meager  manner,  their 
fare  consisting  mostly  of  boiled  corn  and  beans  without  salt.8 
At  the  end  of  their  period  of  confinement  they  were  ordered 
to  leave  the  dominions  of  Spain  and  the  only  property  they 
were  allowed  to  keep  was  their  horses  and  weapons.  The 
value  of  the  seized  property  was  estimated  at  $30,380.74.  The 
traders  returned  to  St.  Louis  arriving  there  in  September 
1817. 

Back  in  St.  Louis,  Demun  lost  no  time  in  writing  to  Gov- 
ernor William  Clark  of  the  Missouri  Territory  to  give  him  a 
"true  and  faithful  account"  of  the  injury  done  to  him  and 
Chouteau.  Demun's  letter  dated  November  25,  1817,  was  ac- 
companied by  other  documents  submitted  as  evidence  in  sup- 
port of  his  statements.  He  even  included  a  corrected  copy  of 
Pike's  map  showing  the  exact  spot,  south  of  the  Arkansas 
River,  where  his  party  was  taken  prisoners.9  Governor  Clark 
transmitted  Demun's  letter  and  accompanying  documents  to 
Secretary  of  State,  John  Quincy  Adams.  It  was  not  too  long 
before  Demun  and  Chouteau  had  the  satisfaction  of  knowing 
that  their  demand  for  adequate  reparation  for  losses  sus- 
tained during  their  expedition  to  New  Mexico  had  been  made 
to  the  Spanish  minister  by  the  government  of  the  United 
States. 

Little  else  was  accomplished  until  February  22,  1819, 
when  a  treaty  was  concluded  between  the  United  States  and 
Spain.  This  treaty,  which  among  other  things  ceded  Florida 
to  the  United  States,  contained  certain  provisions  in  Articles 
III,  IX,  and  XI,  which  vitally  affected  the  outcome  of  the 
Chouteau-Demun  claim.  Article  III  defined  the  western  and 
northern  boundaries  of  the  Louisiana  Territory,  and  recog- 
nized the  Arkansas  River  from  the  point  it  is  intersected  by 
the  100th  meridian  west  longitude  to  its  source  as  the  bound- 
ary line  between  the  United  States  and  Spanish  possessions 

8.  Ibid.  Document  No.  29.  Much  of  this  material  has  been  printed  under  the  title  of 
"Message  and  Correspondence  relating  to  the  Imprisonment  of  citizens  of  the  United 
States"  in  American  State  Papers,  Foreign  Relations,  IV,  pp.  209-213,  edited  by  Walter 
Lowrie  and  Walter  S.  Franklin.  It  is  also  printed  in  Old  Santa  Fe,  I,  pp.  370-374. 

9.  A  copy  of  the  map  in  question  appears  at  the  end  of  the  article. 


THE  CHOUTEAU-DEMUN  EXPEDITION  267 

along-  this  sector.  This  may  have  weakened  the  Chouteau- 
Demun  claim  since  agreement  on  this  boundary  meant  that 
the  Demun  party,  which  was  arrested  south  of  the  Arkansas, 
had  been  operating  in  territory  which  the  United  States  now 
recognized  as  belonging  to  Spain.  In  Article  IX  the  United 
States  agreed  to  assume  responsibility  for  claims  of  Ameri- 
can citizens  against  Spain  arising  from  unlawful  seizure  of 
property  at  sea,  in  ports  and  territories  of  Spain,  or  in  the 
Spanish  colonies.  Article  XI  provided  for  the  establishment 
of  a  Board  of  Commissioners  to  settle  the  claims  of  American 
citizens  against  Spain  for  which  the  United  States  govern- 
ment had  agreed  to  be  responsible  in  Article  IX.  In  order  to 
carry  out  the  provisions  of  the  treaty  under  Articles  IX  and 
XI,  the  American  Congress  on  March  3,  1821,  approved  an 
act  (3  Statutes  639)  authorizing  the  establishment  of  a  Board 
of  Commissioners  consisting  of  3  members  appointed  by  the 
President  to  decide  on  the  validity  and  justice  of  such  claims 
as  were  presented  to  it. 

Demun  and  Chouteau  presented  their  claim  to  this  Board 
where  it  was  filed  as  Claim  No.  587.  The  claimants  were  listed 
as  Auguste  P.  Chouteau,  Julius  Demun  (spelled  Demondi), 
Peter  Chouteau,  and  Bartholomew  Berthould.  Peter  Chou- 
teau was  a  brother  of  Auguste.  Berthould,  formerly  a  native 
of  Bavaria,  had  obtained  naturalization  papers  in  1809  at 
Philadelphia.10  He  was  part  owner  of  the  St.  Louis  firm  of 
Berthould  and  Chouteau. 

The  memorial  presented  to  the  Board  of  Commissioners 
stated  that  in  1815  the  four  claimants  had  bought  a  large 
quantity  of  merchandise  to  trade  with  the  Indians,  and  that 
while  engaged  in  this  peaceful  activity  within  the  boundaries 
of  the  United  States,  a  Spanish  military  force  arrested  the 
entire  party.  The  memorial  added  that  the  group  consist- 
ing of  Chouteau,  Demun,  and  20  other  Americans  were  im- 
prisoned for  a  "considerable  time"  and  that  their  merchan- 
dise and  furs  were  confiscated.  The  claimants  expected  to  be 
reimbursed  for  the  value  of  the  seized  goods  as  well  as  for 

10.  Document  No.  19,  Claim  No.  37,  U.S.  Board  of  Commissioners,  1849-51,  NA,  RG 
76. 


268  NEW    MEXICO    HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

wages  paid  to  the  men  they  employed.  The  total  amount  of 
losses  was  not  given.11 

On  January  31, 1822,  the  memorial  for  Claim  No.  587  was 
read  to  the  Board  of  Commissioners  and  on  that  same  day 
the  claim  was  rejected.12  The  Commissioners  did  not  state  in 
writing  the  reasons  for  their  decision,  but  the  claimants  main- 
tained that  it  was  rejected  because  this  type  of  claim 
was  not  embraced  by  the  provisions  of  the  treaty  of  1819  be- 
tween the  United  States  and  Spain.  The  decision  of  the  Com- 
missioners to  reject  it,  however,  released  the  Spanish  govern- 
ment from  any  further  obligation  in  connection  with  the 
Chouteau-Demun  claim. 

Fortunately  for  Chouteau  and  Demun,  Mexico  had,  in  the 
meantime,  won  its  independence  and  now  had  jurisdiction 
over  the  territory  where  the  claim  originated,  a  fact  which 
led  the  resourceful  traders  to  start  toying  with  the  idea  that 
if  Spain  was  not  liable  for  the  acts  that  had  given  rise  to  their 
claim,  then  the  Mexican  government  should  inherit  the  re- 
sponsibility. After  all,  according  to  international  law,  they 
argued,  a  newly  established  government  inherits  the  privi- 
leges as  well  as  the  responsibilities  and  obligations  of  the 
one  that  preceded  it.  This  line  of  reasoning  made  the  Chou- 
teau-Demun claim,  a  claim  against  Mexico  not  against  Spain. 
It  was  even  argued  by  the  claimants'  counsel  that  Mexico  was 
actually  separated  from  Spain  in  1808  when  Napoleon's  army 
occupied  the  Iberian  peninsula,  and  that  from  that  date  Mex- 
ico had  been  in  substantial  exercise  of  self  government.13 

Chouteau  and  Demun  succeeded  in  advancing  their  line 
of  reasoning  by  enlisting  the  help  of  influential  Senator 
Thomas  H.  Benton,  and  Congressman  John  Scott,  both  of 
Missouri.  At  least  three  letters  were  written,  within  a  5-day 
period,  to  Secretary  of  State  Henry  Clay  in  connection  with 

11.  Claim  No.  587,  Disallowed  Claims,  Vol.  61,  United  States  and  Spanish  Conven- 
tion, 1819,  Records  of  Boundary  and  Claims  Commissions  and  Arbitrations,  NA,  RG  76. 
(There  is  a  slight  inconsistency  in  statements  about  the  number  of  persons  who  were 
imprisoned  and  the  number  of  days  they  were  kept  in  confinement.   The  number  of 
persons  imprisoned  varies  from  20  to  24,  and  the  number  of  days  in  confinement  from 
44  to  48.  There  had  been  45  men  in  the  party  at  one  time. ) 

12.  Minutes  of  the  Board  of  Commissioners,  January  31,   1822,  United  States  and 
Spanish  Convention,  1819,  NA,  RG  76. 

13.  Document  No.  6,  Claim  No.  37,  U.S.  Board  of  Commissioners,  1849-61,  NA,  RG 
76. 


THE  CHOUTEAU-DEMUN  EXPEDITION  269 

this  claim.14  The  first  one  was  written  by  the  claimants  them- 
selves on  May  3,  1825.  Among  other  things,  they  reminded 
the  Secretary  of  State  that  since  negotiations  leading  toward 
the  establishment  of  diplomatic  relations  with  Mexico  were 
then  in  progress,  this  seemed  like  an  appropriate  time  for 
presentation  of  their  claim.  The  second  letter,  dated  May  4, 
1825,  was  from  Senator  Thomas  H.  Benton,  and  its  immedi- 
ate purpose  was  to  inform  the  Secretary  of  State  of  the  de- 
sirability of  continuing  to  extend  aid  and  encouragement  to 
the  claimants.  The  two  claimants  are  described  as  being 
"gentlemen  of  the  first  respectability,  allied  by  blood  and 
marriage  to  the  best  families  of  upper  Louisiana."  The  third 
letter,  dated  May  8, 1825,  was  written  by  Congressman  John 
Scott.  He  urged  that  Chouteau  and  Demun  be  rewarded  as  a 
matter  of  justice  as  well  as  to  help  win  the  affection  of  the 
French  population  in  that  area. 

In  the  years  that  followed,  Chouteau  continued  to  com- 
municate at  infrequent  dates  with  the  Department  of  State. 
On  May  10,  1834,  he  wrote  to  the  Secretary  of  State,  Louis 
McLane,  concerning  his  claim,  stating  that  his  object  in  again 
addressing  the  Department  was  to  solicit  its  official  interven- 
tion in  behalf  of  an  injured  citizen.15  The  Chouteau-Demun 
claim  had  by  this  time  been  officially  presented  by  the  United 
States  to  the  Mexican  government.16 

During  the  1830's,  President  Jackson  recommended  the 
adoption  of  vigorous  measures  to  convince  Mexico  of  the 
need  to  settle  the  claims  of  American  citizens  and  finally  on 
April  11,  1839,  a  convention  was  signed  which  provided  that 
claims  of  United  States  citizens  against  Mexico,  arising  prior 
to  that  date,  should  be  referred  to  a  Board  of  Commissioners 
composed  of  two  Americans,  two  Mexicans,  and  an  Umpire 
from  a  neutral  country.  The  Board  was  given  18  months  to 
decide  upon  the  justice  of  the  claims  and  the  amount  of  com- 
pensation, if  any,  due  from  the  Mexican  government.  The 
rules  of  procedure  provided  that  in  case  of  disagreement  be- 

14.  Miscellaneous  Letters,  May  3,  4,  8,  1825,  General  Records  of  the  Department  of 
State,  NA,  RG  59. 

15.  Document  No.  23,  Claim  No.  37,  U.S.  Board  of  Commissioners,   1849-51,   NA. 
RG  76. 

16.  Ibid.  Document  No.  12. 


270  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

tween  the  Commissioners,  the  dispute  should  be  referred  to 
the  Umpire  for  a  final  decision. 

The  establishment  of  this  Board  gave  Chouteau  and  De- 
mun  their  second  opportunity  to  present  their  claim.  This 
time  it  was  filed  as  Claim  No.  94,  and  the  claimants  were 
listed  as  Auguste  P.  Chouteau  and  Julius  Demun.  On  July  21, 
1841,  their  claim  was  presented  to  the  Commissioners  for 
settlement,  but  a  decision  could  not  be  reached  because  the 
evidence  submitted  to  establish  its  validity  was  considered  in- 
sufficient, and  because  there  was  some  disagreement  as  to  the 
liability  of  Mexico.  When  it  came  again  for  settlement  on 
February  8,  1842,  the  Commissioners  disagreed  along  na- 
tional lines.  The  two  American  Commissioners  regarded  it  as 
a  valid  claim  against  Mexico  and  recommended  that  the 
claimants  be  awarded  $75,495.04,  of  which  $30,  380.74  was 
compensation  for  the  seized  merchandise  and  $45,114.30  for 
accumulated  interest.17  The  two  Mexican  Commissioners  who 
were  apparently  unaware  that  this  claim  had  already  been 
presented  and  rejected  as  a  claim  against  Spain,  strenuously 
urged  that  Spain  not  Mexico  should  make  idemnification  for 
the  alleged  wrongs,  if  any  had  been  committed.  They  pointed 
out  that  the  acts  complained  of  were  committed  in  1817  when 
Spanish  authorities  had  control  of  New  Mexico.18  It  was  diffi- 
cult to  convince  the  Mexican  Commissioners  that  their  coun- 
try should  be  held  responsible  for  events  that  occurred  before 
it  existed  as  an  independent  nation.  Since  the  Commissioners 
could  not  agree,  the  Chouteau-Demun  claim  was  referred  on 
February  22,  1842,  just  3  days  before  the  expiration  date  of 
the  Board  of  Commissioners,  to  the  Umpire  for  a  final  deci- 
sion. The  Umpire  was  unable  to  examine  and  render  the  final 
judgment  before  the  expiration  date,  and  so  the  claim  re- 
mained undecided.  But  to  the  two  claimants  who  had  so  per- 
sistently sought  reparation  it  meant  that  they  would  never 
know  how  it  ended,  since  both  died  before  a  final  judgment 
was  rendered. 

The  final  settlement  came  as  an  aftermath  to  the  War  be- 
tween Mexico  and  the  United  States.  The  treaty  of  Guadalupe 

17.  Ibid.  Document  No.  7. 

18.  Ibid.  Document  No.  3. 


THE   CHOUTEAU-DEMUN  EXPEDITION  271 

Hidalgo,  which  ended  the  war,  provided  for  the  assumption 
by  the  United  States  of  all  claims  of  American  citizens 
against  Mexico  which  arose  prior  to  the  date  of  signing  the 
treaty.  This  included  claims  which  had  remained  undecided 
under  the  Convention  of  1839  and  made  the  Chouteau-Demun 
eligible  for  presentation.  A  United  States  Claims  Commission 
composed  of  3  members  was  established  to  decide  on  the 
validity  of  the  claims  presented  and  to  determine  the  amount 
of  compensation  due  each  claimant.  Pierre  Chouteau,  Jr., 
who  was  named  administrator19  of  the  estates  of  Chouteau 
and  Demun,  presented  the  claim  to  this  Commission  where 
it  was  filed  as  Claim  No.  37.  Thomas  H.  Benton,  an  ardent  de- 
fender of  rights  of  western  pioneers,  and  one  of  the  most  in- 
fluential politicians  in  Washington,  served  as  counsel  for  the 
claimants. 

The  rules  of  procedure  adopted  by  the  Commission  re- 
quired that  written  evidence  be  submitted  to  prove  that  the 
value  of  the  seized  property  was  really  $30,380.74  as  stated 
in  the  memorial.  Some  difficulty  was  encountered  in  satisfy- 
ing this  requirement  since  key  documents  could  not  be  made 
available.  Pierre  Chouteau,  Jr.,  maintained  that  satisfactory 
documentary  proof  had  already  been  placed  in  the  hands  of 
the  Executive  and  Legislative  Branches  of  the  Government. 
According  to  him,  Governor  Clark  transmitted  this  documen- 
tary proof  to  the  Secretary  of  State  in  1817. 20  The  proof 
which  supposedly  consisted  of  a  detailed  and  authenticated 
account  of  the  actual  outlay  and  capital  expended  for  the  ex- 
pedition was  now  lost  or  misplaced.  Pierre  Chouteau,  Jr.,  de- 
clared that  no  copies  of  these  important  records  were  kept 
by  the  claimants  and  added  that  "after  the  lapse  of  so  many 
years,  the  memory  of  witnesses  cannot  be  relied  to  supply 
their  place."  He  expressed  high  hopes  that  the  Executive  and 
the  Legislative  Branches  would  find  the  misplaced  docu- 
ments.21 

Thorough  searches  for  the  missing  records  were  made  in 

19.  Ibid.  Document  No.  6. 

20.  This   refers   to  the  map   and  accompanying   documents,   which   Demun   sent  to 
Governor  Clark.   See  footnote  No.   9. 

21.  Document  No.  1,  Claim  No.  37,  U.S.  Board  of  Commissioners,  1849-51,  NA,  RG 
76. 


272  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

the  Office  of  the  Senate,  the  House  of  Representatives,  and  in 
the  Department  of  State.22  The  result  of  these  searches  was 
submitted  in  writing  to  the  Claims  Commission.  The  Secre- 
tary of  the  Senate  reported  that  a  search  had  been  conducted 
in  the  file  of  the  Senate  for  "Statements  marked  A,  B,  C,  and 
D  of  expenditures  of  Chouteau  and  Demun,"  but  that  the 
papers  in  question  had  not  been  found.  The  Clerk  of  the  House 
of  Representatives  reported  that  a  careful  search  was  made 
in  the  files  of  the  Office  and  the  Journals  of  the  House,  but 
that  he  could  find  no  evidence  that  any  papers  had  been  with- 
drawn from  the  House.  The  Secretary  of  State,  Daniel  Web- 
ster, reported  that  a  thorough  but  fruitless  search  had  been 
made  in  the  Department  for  the  desired  documents. 

Since  the  original  documents  could  not  be  located,  the  only 
alternative  was  to  submit  affidavits  from  persons  who  were 
familiar  with  the  events  that  had  taken  place  in  1815.  At 
least  three  such  affidavits  were  prepared  and  submitted  to 
the  Commission.23  The  first  one  was  a  sworn  statement  by 
John  B.  Saisy  (Saify) ,  a  clerk  employed  by  the  St.  Louis  firm 
of  Berthould  and  Chouteau,  the  firm  from  which  Auguste  P. 
Chouteau  and  Julius  Demun  had  purchased  their  supplies 
for  the  expedition.  Saisy  declared  that  from  a  study  of  the 
records  and  memoranda  made  many  years  ago,  he  found  that 
the  account  of  Chouteau  and  Demun  with  the  firm  of  Ber- 
thould and  Chouteau,  for  goods  and  money  advanced  for  the 
expedition,  was  $26,700.  The  clerk  also  stated  that  he  knew 
that  Demun  arrived  in  St.  Louis  from  the  expedition  in  a 
destitute  condition.  The  information  in  the  second  affidavit 
was  furnished  by  Etienne  Provost,  who  declared  that  he  was 
one  of  the  men  employed  by  Chouteau  and  Demun  to  go  on 
the  expedition  and  that  of  the  42  men  who  participated  only 
two  others  were  still  alive,  neither  of  whom  was  living  in  the 
state  of  Missouri.  He  added  that  the  commanders  of  the  expe- 
dition, Mr.  Chouteau  and  Mr.  Demun  lost  everything,  their 
goods,  horses,  furs,  lead,  and  powder,  and  that  he  believed 
that  the  value  of  the  goods  amounted  at  least  to  the  sum  of 
$30,000.  The  third  affidavit  was  prepared  by  Julius  Demun  in 

22.lbid.  Document  Nos.  9,  10,  and  24. 
23.  Ibid.  Document  No.  13. 


THE  CHOUTEAU-DEMUN  EXPEDITION  273 

1841.  He  declared  that  on  his  arrival  from  Santa  Fe,  he  was 
without  a  shirt,  leggings,  or  shoes,  and  that  these  articles  of 
clothing  were  supplied  him  by  the  kindness  of  an  Osage  In- 
dian chief  before  his  entry  into  St.  Louis. 

These  sworn  statements  were  submitted  to  the  Claims 
Commission  as  proof  of  the  justice  of  the  Chouteau-Demun 
claim,  and  as  evidence  of  the  amount  of  losses  sustained  by 
the  leaders  of  the  expedition. 

After  examining  and  evaluating  the  evidence  the  three 
Commissioners  rendered  their  decision.  They  found  the  claim 
of  Pierre  Chouteau,  Jr.,  Administrator  of  the  estates  of 
Auguste  P.  Chouteau  and  Julius  Demun,  to  be  a  valid  claim 
and  awarded  the  estate  $81,772.00,  of  which  $30,380.00  was 
compensation  for  the  seized  merchandise,  and  $51,392.00  for 
accumulated  interest.24  A  United  States  Treasury  warrant, 
No.  4735,  for  the  total  amount  was  issued  on  May  17,  1851, 
bringing  the  Chouteau-Demun  claim  to  its  final  conclusion.25 


24.  Awards,  Vol.  I,  pp.  58-59,  U.S.  Board  of  Commissioners,  1949-51,  NA,  RG  76. 

25.  Treasury  Warrants,   1851,   Records  of  the  General  Accounting  Office,   NA,   RG 
217. 

[See  Map  in  Notes  and  Documents,  Pp.  347.] 


FRANK  BOND:  GENTLEMAN  SHEEPHERDER 
OF  NORTHERN  NEW  MEXICO,  1883-1915 

By  FRANK  H.  GRUBBS 
6.    Bond  &  Nohl  Company 


THE  Bond  &  Nohl  Company  was  formally  organized  on 
Friday,  April  6,  1906,  with  50,000  shares  of  one  dollar 
capital  stock,  issued  16,000  shares  each  to  Frank  Bond, 
George  Bond,  and  Louis  F.  Nohl,  and  2,000  shares  to  Jose 
Leandro  Martinez.1  Frank  Bond  was  president  of  the  new 
corporation,  George  W.  Bond  was  vice-president,  and  Louis 
F.  Nohl,  salaried  at  $140  per  month,2  was  secretary,  treas- 
urer, and  general  manager.  The  home  of  the  new  company 
was  Espanola,  New  Mexico,  where  as  an  extension  of  the 
partnership  of  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  it  engaged  for  thirty-eight 
years  in  a  more  widely  diversified  field  of  business  than  any 
of  the  other  Bond  interests. 

The  corporate  organization  of  the  Bond  &  Nohl  Company 
was  created  in  1906,  but  its  practical  beginning  was  in  1900 
when  Louis  F.  Nohl  joined  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  in  a  profit- 
sharing  capacity.  To  carry  the  matter  further,  it  may  even 
be  said  that  it  was  born  of  evolution  rather  than  creation. 
Since  Frank  Bond  continued  to  operate  his  own  business 
from  Espanola,  actually  headquartering  with  Bond  &  Nohl, 
it  is  probable  that  the  townspeople  were  unaware  of  any 
change  in  organization  other  than  the  name  on  the  front  of 
the  store. 

Louis  Nohl  entered  the  new  organization  under  a  cloud 
of  tragedy.  Just  a  month  after  the  new  company  was  formed, 
his  first  wife  died,  leaving  Nohl  with  their  six  children.3  At 
this  time  he  had  a  net  worth  of  $4,886  which  by  July  31, 1909, 
the  date  of  Nohl's  second  marriage,  had  grown  to  $17,833.17 

1.  Stock  Certificates  (in  the  files  of  Frank  Bond  &  Son,  Inc.,  Albuquerque). 

2.  Record  of  Minutes  (in  the  files  of  Frank  Bond  &  Son,  Inc.,  Albuquerque). 

3.  Miscellaneous  papers  re  estate  of  Louis  F.  Nohl,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

274 


FRANK  BOND  275 

due  entirely  to  his  participation  in  profits  of  the  Bond  &  Nohl 
Company.4  Nohl  received  his  stock  interest  in  the  company 
in  exchange  for  his  personal  note,  and  in  1909  G.  W.  Bond  & 
Bro.  held  this  note  in  the  amount  of  $12,078.25.5  Thus  it  was 
that  Louis  Nohl  was  received  into  the  Bond  management 
family  on  the  same  generous  terms  that  so  many  others  were 
fortunate  enough  to  enjoy. 

Leandro  Martinez,  the  minority  stockholder,  was  gen- 
erally employed  as  an  outside  man,  or  general  foreman,  but 
the  way  in  which  he  acquired  his  stock  is  unknown.  However, 
when  he  left  the  firm  in  1913,  he  surrendered  his  2,000  shares 
of  stock.  These  were  returned  to  Bond  &  Nohl  in  January, 
1914,  and  were  carried  thenceforth  as  treasury  stock.  There 
is  no  record  of  how  much  he  received  at  the  time  he  sur- 
rendered his  interest,  and  after  leaving  Bond  &  Nohl  he 
joined  with  Leo  Hersch  to  provide  backing  to  Morris  and 
Clark  in  putting  up  store  buildings  in  Espanola.  Frank  Bond 
rather  expected  Leandro  to  interfere  some  with  the  lamb 
business,6  but  if  he  did  there  was  never  any  further  mention 
of  the  matter  although  he  was  later  suspected  of  buying  wool 
for  Charles  Ilfeld.7 

At  the  end  of  1906,  the  first  year  of  business,  the  mer- 
chandise stock  of  Bond  &  Nohl  was  valued  at  almost  $63,000, 
but  merchandise  inventories  throughout  the  period  from 
1907  through  1915  were  generally  maintained  at  a  somewhat 
lower  but  relatively  constant  level  of  about  $55,000.  An  item- 
ization  of  the  more  significant  items  in  the  1906  inventory 
has  been  located,  and  these  commodities  are  listed  in  Table  36 
as  representing  typical  investments  and  suggesting  the  large 
quantities  of  staple  goods  that  were  carried. 

Inventory  activity  remained  fairly  steady  from  1906 
through  1915  as  shown  in  Table  37.  There  being  no  way  to 

4.  Ibid. 
6.  Ibid. 

6.  Letter  Book  No.  53,  June  17,  1914,  p.  43.  The  individuals  from  whom  Bond  cus- 
tomarily purchased  sheep  and  wool  were  usually  referred  to  as   "customers,"  and  at- 
tempts by  outsiders  to  trade  with  those  customers  was  considered  to  be  interference. 
The  modern   term   would   be  "competition,"   but   this   term   today   does   not   carry   the 
overtones  of  knavery  that  seem  to  have  been   implicit  in   "interference."   Bond   used 
both  terms,  and  his  usage  implies  a  distinction  in  this  sense. 

7.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  March  24,  1915,  p.  450. 


276  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

determine  average  inventory  levels,  the  inventory  turnover 
has  been  computed  by  relating  year-end  inventory  levels  to 
the  cost  of  merchandise  sold. 

TABLE  36 

MAJOR  COMMODITY  ITEMS  IN 
BOND  &  NOHL  INVENTORY,  1906 

Quantity  Item  Price  Amount 

181,291  Ibs                 Pinons  $  .07  $12,690.37 

24,000  Ibs                1st  Grade  Flour  1.75  420.00 

115,500  Ibs                 2nd  Grade  Flour  1.60  1,732.50 

84,449  Ibs                 Wheat  1.00  844.49 

Black  Leaf  .  .  .  1,267.31 

Surplus  Stock «  .  .  .  3,000.00 

a.  Shoes  purchased  on  account  of  an  advancing  market. 

TABLE  37 
BOND  &  NOHL INVENTORY  TURNOVER 

Year  Turnover 

1906  1.9 

1907  3.1 

1908  2.3 

1909  • 

1910  2.4 

1911  2.3 

1912  2.6 

1913  2.7 

1914  2.3 

1915  2.6 

a.  Sales  data  not  available. 

The  Bond  &  Nohl  sales  and  profit  data  shown  in  Table  38 
indicate  the  size  of  the  mercantile  business  for  the  years 
through  1915  and  represent  a  wide  variety  of  items  as  might 
be  expected  in  a  general  mercantile  establishment.  There 
were  staples,8  alfalfa,  hay,  caskets,9  pencil  sharpeners  in- 

8.  Typical  prices  were:   flour,  $1.25   per  sack;  granulated  sugar,   $1.00  for   14   Ib. 
sack;  coffee,  $.25  Ib. ;  lard  compound,  $1.35  for  10  Ib.  pail;  coal  oil,  $.35  gal.;  laundry 
soap  (brown  or  white),  $.05  bar.  Letter  Book  No.  5S,  June  16,  1914,  p.  25. 

9.  Itemized  expenses  for  the  burial  of  a  deceased  pensioner  in  1914  included  $4.10 
for  the  coffin  and  $6.00  fee  for  the  priest.    (Letter  Book  No.  5S,  July  4,  1914,  p.  261.) 
In  1881  the  cost  of  burying  an  indigent  in  Santa  Fe  County  was  $30.  Sister  Blandina 
Segale,  At  the  End  of  the  Santa  Fe  Trail  (Columbus,  Ohio:  The  Columbian  Press,  1932), 
p.  180. 


FRANK  BOND  277 

TABLE  38 

BOND  &  NOHL  SALES  AND  PROFIT  ON  MERCHANDISE 
(dollars  in  thousands) 

Year  Cash  Credit  Total  Gross  Profit 

Sales  Sales  Sales  on  Merchandise 

1906  $46.5       $100.7       $147.2       $27.3 

1907  49.8  133.3  183.1  31.3 

1908  43.1  100.6  143.7  21.3 

1909  ...  ...  ...  22.4 

1910  57.2  103.2  160.4  25.4 

1911  55.1  106.2  161.3  28.1 

1912  51.6  120.3  171.9  27.3 

1913  55.3  115.1  170.4  27.8 

1914  40.5  106.2  146.7  33.6 

1915  48.5  114.2  162.7  22.7 

a.  Gross  profits  on  wool  and  on  sheep  trading  are  reported  in  Tables  39  and  40 
respectively.  Profits  are  summarized  and  net  profits  are  shown  in  Table  42. 

eluding-  coupons  for  sharpening  the  sharpener,  clothing, 
meats,  Indian  pottery,  chile,  blankets,  Bain  wagons,10  guns, 
ammunition,  fencing,  buggies,  Victor  Talking  machines,  Vic- 
trola  records,11  refrigerators,  patent  medicines,12  and 
pinons.13  Some  commodities  were  handled  in  large  lots,  par- 
ticularly such  items  as  hay,  beans,  chile,  and  pinons.14 

Every  effort  was  made  to  fill  orders  for  almost  any  item. 
Once  a  customer  ordered  a  heater,  and  in  asking  the  supplier 
to  quote  a  price  it  was  requested  that  he  add  25  per  cent  to 
the  price  of  the  heater  so  that  they  could  show  the  customer 
the  quotation  telegram.15  If  the  item  could  not  be  obtained 
or  was  not  in  stock,  the  order  was  turned  over  to  the  Espanola 
Mercantile  Company,16  and  the  customer  was  so  notified. 
Goods  were  never  consigned,  and  although  both  cash  and 
credit  business  was  conducted,  there  was  only  one  price.  For 

10.  The  profit  on  a  wagon  was  about  $10.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  May  17,  1915. 

11.  One  order  for  Victrola  records  to  the  Knight-Campbell  Music  Company  in  Denver 
included  such  favorites  as  "Ballin"  the  Jack,"  "Memphis  Blues,"  "Rose  of  the  Mountain 
Trail,"  "Peg  O*  My  Heart,"  "Roamin'  in  the  Gloamiri',"  "She  is  My  Daisy,"  "Italian 
Street  Song,"  and  "Oh,  It's  Nice  To  Get  Up  In  the  Morning,  But  It's  Nicer  To  Stay  In 
Bed."  Letter  Book  No.  58,  July  1,  1915,  p.  703. 

12.  Wine  of  Cardui  and  Black  Draught.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  July  13,  1915,  p.  133. 

13.  Letter  Books,  passim. 

14.  Supra,  Table  86. 

15.  Letter  Book  No.  50,  December  19,  1913,  p.  526. 

16.  Ibid.,  October  20,  1913,  p.  134 ;  infra,  chap.  xi. 


278  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

a  time  a  dual  pricing  structure  was  tried  under  which 
separate  prices  for  cash  and  for  credit  were  maintained,  but 
finding  it  to  be  completely  unworkable,  it  was  abandoned.17 

Dealing  in  a  wide  variety  of  merchandise  had  its  head- 
aches as  well  as  its  profits,  particularly  in  connection  with 
fairly  large  commodity  transactions.  Pinons  in  New  Mexico 
are  a  highly  seasonal  and  uncertain  crop,  harvested  by  hand 
in  the  vast  stretches  of  pinon  forests  that  cover  much  of  the 
central  and  northern  New  Mexico  mountains.  Pinons  are 
highly  sensitive  to  the  effects  of  wind  and  weather  so  that  the 
crop  is  frequently  almost  nonexistent.  There  was  usually  a 
large  demand  for  pinon  nuts  by  the  eastern  specialty  houses, 
and  an  investment  in  pinons  could  often  be  held  for  some 
time  against  an  advance  in  the  market  for  the  nuts  keep  well 
without  any  special  warehousing  requirements. 

Charles  E.  Doll,  of  Santa  Fe,  had  such  a  pinon  ware- 
house,18 and  in  1913  Bond  &  Nohl  entered  into  an  agreement 
with  him  under  which  they  were  each  to  purchase  pinon  nuts, 
sell  them,  and  share  in  the  profits.19  This  agreement  covered 
all  pinon  nuts  that  Doll  should  buy,  regardless  of  where  he 
bought  them.  The  agreement  was  a  verbal  one,  and  at  the 
end  of  the  season  Frank  Bond  found  that  he  had  bought  all 
the  pinons  and  made  all  the  profits  while  Doll  ostensibly  had 
bought  no  pinons  and  made  no  money  for  Bond.  Satisfied  that 
Doll  was  not  living  up  to  his  agreement,  Bond  put  a  man  out 
on  the  road  to  make  further  inquiries,  and  found  that  Doll 
had  actually  sold  and  shipped  large  quantities  of  pinons  with- 
out sharing  the  profits  with  Bond.  Pressed,  Doll  would  not 
admit  that  he  had  made  any  sales  and  would  not  pay  the  Bond 
claim.  In  November  of  the  following  year  Bond  offered  to 
settle  the  account  if  Doll  would  remit  $3,500  cash  and  threat- 
ened to  bring  suit  if  he  didn't  pay  within  a  week.  A.  B.  Rene- 
han,  of  the  Santa  Fe  law  firm  of  Renehan  and  Wright,  was 
representing  Bond  in  the  matter,  and  Doll  immediately 
waited  upon  Renehan ;  presenting  evidence  of  further  ship- 
ments, he  asked  Renehan  to  represent  him.  Louis  Nohl  felt 

17.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  August  28,  1915,  p.  525. 

18.  Interview  with  J.  E.  Davenport. 

19.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  December  7,  1914,  p.  240. 


FRANK   BOND  279 

that  an  old  grievance  between  Doll  and  himself  had  influenced 
Doll  to  take  the  position  he  did,  and  Nohl  had  evidence  that 
Doll  had  sold  at  least  110,000  pounds  of  pinons  to  Birdsong 
Brothers  in  New  York.  He  promptly  wrote  them  asking  for 
details  of  the  shipments,  but  they  refused  and  then  promptly 
filed  a  claim  against  Bond  &  Nohl.  The  claim  received  a  cold 
reception  at  Espanola.  At  this  point  Bond  went  to  work  in 
earnest.  He  wrote  letters  to  forty-seven  fruit  and  nut  dealers 
in  New  York,  San  Francisco,  Chicago,  Los  Angeles,  and  St. 
Louis  asking  for  information  on  pinon  transactions  with 
Doll.  Most  of  the  inquiries  were  fruitless,  but  one  dealer  in 
New  York  City  reported  that  they  had  bought  240,000  pounds 
of  pinons  from  Doll  at  prices  ranging  up  to  nine  cents  per 
hundred. 

Although  Doll  had  sold  at  least  350,000  pounds  of  pinons, 
he  still  didn't  pay  Bond  his  share  of  the  profits,  and  by  May, 
1915,  Bond  was  about  willing  to  settle  for  $1,000  out  of  sheer 
exasperation.  Settlement  was  made  shortly  thereafter,  but 
Bond  paid  the  attorneys'  fee  of  $250.20  Referring  mildly  to 
Doll's  "cussedness,"  Bond  commented :  "We  are  glad  to  know 
that  Charlie  realizes  that  he  has  acted  dishonorably  in  this 
matter  and  that  he  is  truly  repentant.  I  just  wish  to  say  to 
you,  that  we  intend  to  overlook  this  unkindness  on  Charlie's 
part  to  a  very  large  extent."21 

It  is  apparent  from  an  examination  of  the  sales  data  in 
Table  37,  supra,  that  a  large  part  of  the  sales  were  on  credit. 
Terms  of  sale  on  staple  items  were  usually  2  per  cent  for  cash 
in  ten  days,  but  on  at  least  one  occasion  a  customer  deducted 
a  cash  discount  on  an  invoice  that  was  ten  months  old.  He 
didn't  get  away  with  it.22 

All  the  stores  in  the  Bond  system  sold  a  great  deal  of  their 

20.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  November  20,  1914,  p.  104 ;  ibid.,  November  26,  1914,  p.  149 ; 
ibid.,  December  2,  1914,  p.  184 ;  ibid.,  December  7,  1914,  p.  240 ;  ibid.,  December  17,  1914, 
p.  309  ;  ibid.,  December  29,  1914,  p.  392  ;  ibid.,  January  27,  1915,  p.  610  ;  ibid.,  January  30, 
1915,  p.  644 ;  Letter  Book  No.  57,  March  9,  1915,  p.  314 ;  ibid.,  March  10,  1915,  pp.  344- 
348 ;  ibid.,  March  15,  1915,  pp.  368ff. ;  ibid.,  March  17,  1915,  p.  388 ;  ibid..  March  18,  1915, 
p.  424 ;  ibid.,  April  5,  1915,  p.  520 ;  Letter  Book  No.  58,  May  19,  1915,  p.  198 ;  ibid.,  June 
1,  1915,  p.  639 ;  ibid.,  June  1,  1915,  p.  346. 

21.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  June  1,  1915,  p.  342. 

22.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  February  2,  1915,  p.  689 ;  Letter  Book  No.  50,  October  11, 
1913,  p.  36. 


280  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

merchandise  on  credit,  of  course,  and  it  was  standard  prac- 
tice to  value  the  receivable  to  reflect  anticipated  collectibles. 
From  1900  they  were  valued  at  ninety  cents  on  the  dollar, 
but  in  1907  the  valuation  of  accounts  receivable  was  reduced 
to  85  per  cent  of  book  value.  Thereafter,  the  offset  against 
receivables  varied  percentagewise  from  year  to  year,  being 
as  high  as  20  per  cent  and  as  low  as  10  per  cent.23  These  varia- 
tions resulted  from  a  careful  and  realistic  analysis  of  the 
receivables  for  the  purpose  of  determining  exactly  which  ones 
would  and  which  ones  probably  would  not  be  collected. 

A  great  deal  can  be  learned  about  a  man  by  observing  the 
way  in  which  he  conducts  one  of  the  most  sensitive  aspects  of 
his  business — credit.  Frank  Bond  recognized  the  importance 
of  collecting  those  sums  which  were  due  him,  yet  he  mani- 
fested a  great  deal  of  patience  and  understanding  as  he  pur- 
sued his  due.  Respect  for  his  own  rights  was  interwoven  with 
his  respect  for  the  dignity  and  honor  of  his  customers  and 
friends.  He  utilized  both  the  Bradstreet  Company  and  the 
R.  G.  Dun  Company  for  special  investigations  and  as  his 
main  source  of  credit  reference.24  Collections  were  normally 
handled  directly,  but  instances  did  sometimes  arise  that  made 
the  services  of  attorneys,  collection  agents,  or  investigators 
desirable.  Early  in  1915,  for  instance,  Frank  Bond  was  in- 
formed that  Alfredo  Lucero,  of  Santa  Cruz,  had  mortgaged 
his  merchandise  stock  for  which  he  had  not  yet  paid  Bond  & 
Nohl.  Bond  demanded  immediate  settlement  of  the  account, 
whereupon  Lucero  denied  that  the  stock  was  mortgaged.  The 
Bradstreet  and  Dun  companies  were  asked  to  investigate  the 
facts,  absolving  Lucero.25 

These  concerns  were  also  asked  upon  occasion  to  make 
collections,26  although  relatively  complex  collection  problems 
were  sometimes  handled  more  directly.  On  one  occasion  R.  M. 
Willis  of  Carson,  New  Mexico,  had  fallen  behind  in  his  ac- 

28.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

24.  Propositions  received  from  other  companies  not  known  personally  by  Bond  were 
given  scant  consideration  if  they  were  not  listed  with  Dun  or  Bradstreet.  Letter  Book 
No.  58,  June  1.  1915,  p.  350. 

25.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  February  25,   1915,  p.  210;  ibid.,  February  27,   1915,  pp. 
234-235. 

26.  Ibid.,  February  27,  1915,  p.  234. 


FRANK  BOND  281 

count,  and  Frank  Bond  undertook  to  help  him  find  a  buyer 
for  some  water-soaked  and  alkali-covered  ranch  property  so 
that  Willis  could  pay  his  account.  Bond  finally  accepted  with 
some  reluctance  the  deed  to  the  ranch  and  continued  to  search 
for  a  buyer.27  The  American  Adjusting  Company  in  San 
Francisco,  California,  was  used  occasionally  for  collecting 
notes  and  accounts  as  also  were  attorneys.28  Judge  Julius  C. 
Gunter  in  Denver,  Colorado,  collected  some  of  the  largest 
notes  that  were  handled,  and  Benjamin  M.  Read  in  Santa  Fe 
did  some  collection  work. 

Judge  Read  handled  one  assignment  concerning  the  col- 
lection of  a  number  of  small  accounts  receivable  that  Bond 
&  Nohl  acquired  along  with  the  stock  of  the  Seligman  Dry 
Goods  Company  from  Adolf  Seligman  of  Santa  Fe.  They  were 
turned  over  to  Read  for  collection  on  a  percentage  basis,  and 
the  petty  ledger  was  forwarded  to  him.  Some  difficulty  arose, 
however,  when  Seligman  made  some  strenuous  efforts  to 
collect  the  accounts  himself  even  though  they  were  no  longer 
his.  Bond  referred  the  matter  to  E.  A.  Johnson,  an  attorney 
with  Renehan  and  Wright,  but  later  Bond  addressed  himself 
directly  to  Seligman,  stating  that  he  was  sorry  to  hear  of  his 
condition  and  saying  that :  "It  has  never  been  our  policy  to 
push  any  man  to  the  wall.  I  would  suggest  that  you  do  not 
worry  about  these  little  matters  and  I  surely  hope  that  your 
financial  condition  may  improve."29 

Notwithstanding  Bond's  usual  caution,  a  gypsy  by  the 
name  of  Alejandro  Nicholas  walked  into  the  store  one  day 
and  presented  an  endorsed  check  for  $8.92  in  payment  of 
some  goods.  The  air  in  the  store  must  have  been  somewhat 
strained  when  it  became  necessary  for  Bond  to  write  the 
First  National  Bank  in  Santa  Fe  asking  them  to  cancel  Bond 
&  Nohl's  endorsement,  collect  from  the  gypsy,  and  return  the 
check.30 

Frank  Bond  was  always  willing  to  cooperate  as  much  as 

27.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  May  1,  1915,  p.  18 ;  ibid.,  May  7,  1915,  p.  86 ;  ibid.,  May  19, 
1915,  p.  196  ;  ibid.,  June  11,  1915,  p.  465. 

28.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  April  12,  1915,  p.  600  ;  ibid.,  April  29,  1915,  p.  701. 

29.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  May  15,  1915,  p.  137 ;  ibid.,  May  21,  1915,  p.  248  ;  ibid.,  June 
7,  1915,  p.  430 ;  ibid.,  June  14,  1915,  p.  510. 

80.  Ibid.,  June  14,  1915,  p.  486. 


282  NEW    MEXICO    HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

possible  with  deserving  people  who  sincerely  worked  to  get 
themselves  out  of  difficulty,  and  upon  receipt  of  a  ten-dollar 
payment  from  Jose  Quintana,  Bond  wrote  to  him:  "If  you 
continue  paying  on  your  note  right  along  we  will  help  you 
out  some  on  the  interest."31 

Possibly  the  most  interesting,  frustrating,  and  colorful 
collection  problem  that  ever  faced  the  respectable  pillars  of 
business  in  the  offices  of  Bond  &  Nohl  concerned  two  irascible 
spinsters  who  lived  together  on  a  ranch  located  about  six 
miles  south  of  Espanola — the  Misses  Bryan  and  True.  Frank 
Bond  was  wary  of  these  two  testy  ladies  as  early  as  1907 
when  he  warned  C.  L.  Pollard :  "There  is  no  use  having  any 
Quixotic  ideas  in  regard  to  this  lady  [Miss  True].  She  has 
taken  advantage  of  your  friendship."32  By  late  1914  they  had 
accumulated  an  overdue  account  with  Bond  &  Nohl  amount- 
ing to  $1,000  for  which  they  gave  their  note.33  The  note  finally 
became  as  badly  in  arrears  as  were  the  accounts  in  the  first 
place,  and  the  note  was  turned  over  to  Renehan  and  Wright 
for  collection.  The  attorneys  prepared  suit  to  be  served  on  the 
two  choleric  delinquents  by  F.  A.  Geis,  Bond's  stenographer. 
Thereupon  Miss  True  paid  $250,  with  the  result  that  Judge 
Wright  was  asked  to  hold  the  suit  in  abeyance  until  the  first 
of  the  year  when  the  note  would  be  paid.  In  January,  when 
they  had  not  paid  the  balance,  Nohl  asked  that  judgment  be 
entered  against  them  in  accordance  with  their  agreement 
when  the  suit  was  postponed.  Shortly  thereafter,  then,  a 
check  was  received;  this  was  followed  by  another  payment 
which,  however,  was  in  the  form  of  a  check  payable  only  on 
condition  that  the  suit  not  be  prosecuted.  By  the  end  of  Janu- 
ary they  were  trying  to  collect  the  attorney's  fee  from  Miss 
True.  In  February  they  complained  that  nothing  had  been 
done  and  asked  A.  B.  Renehan  to  force  another  payment.  By 
the  end  of  March  the  perplexed  Bond  and  Nohl  were  wonder- 
ing what  to  do  next.  They  wrote  Miss  True  warning  that  she 
had  until  April  3  to  pay  the  balance,  and  to  the  relief  of  all 
a  few  days  later  Judge  Wright  must  have  had  a  stern  session 

31.  Ibid.,  May  18,  1916,  p.  160. 

82.  Letter  Booh  No.  6,  September  17,  1907. 

33.  Interview  with  J.  E.  Davenport. 


FRANK   BOND  283 

with  Miss  True  for  he  reported  that  he  had  adjusted  the 
matter  satisfactorily.  This,  however,  was  not  to  be.  In  May, 
Nohl  complained  to  his  attorneys  that  they  hadn't  yet  re- 
ceived anything  from  Miss  Clara  D.  True  or  Miss  Bryan,  and 
in  June  a  judgment  was  finally  taken  against  Miss  True  who 
promptly  appealed  to  Frank  Bond  for  just  sixty  days'  more 
time  in  which  to  pay  the  balance  which  was  now  down  to 
$550.  He  agreed.  In  August,  after  the  sixty  days  were  past, 
Miss  True  tried  another  tack.  She  wrote  directly  to  Frank 
Bond,  lodging  complaints  against  Louis  Nohl.  Bond  replied : 

I  look  for  Mr.  Nohl  to  be  here  Saturday  of  this  week,  and  you 
can  take  up  this  matter  with  him,  or  if  you  prefer  to  leave  a 
message  with  me  I  will  surely  see  that  it  is  promptly  delivered 
to  him.  ...  I  take  no  part  whatever  in  the  management  of 
this  business,  except  as  regards  the  purchase  of  sheep  and 
wool.  I  do  not  interfere  with  Mr.  Nohl  one  particle,  and  we 
adopt  the  same  policy  with  all  our  managers.  We  look  to  them 
solely  for  results. 

It  has  always  been  the  policy  of  Bond  &  Nohl  Company 
and  all  the  Bond  stores  to  treat  everybody  honorably,  cour- 
teously and  considerately,  and  I  should  hate  to  think  that  you 
have  been  treated  otherwise.  You  know  that  we  would  not 
intentionally  do  you  an  injustice  and  that  we  fully  appreciate 
your  good  will  and  friendship.34 

In  September,  Bond  tried  to  shake  her  off  again  by  asking 
that  further  correspondence  be  addressed  to  the  Bond  &  Nohl 
Company.  The  matter  was  finally  cleared  up  sometime  later 
that  year  when  Miss  True's  foreman  was  driving  a  herd  of 
her  cattle  northward  through  Espanola.  John  Davenport, 
determined  to  settle  the  matter,  simply  seized  the  cattle  and 
closed  the  account.35 

Some  minor  activity  in  hides  and  pelts  produced  small 
profits,  but  they  never  exceeded  $1,000  a  year.  The  same  is 
true  of  a  number  of  miscellaneous  minor  profit-producing 
transactions  that  occasionally  occurred  outside  the  merchan- 
dise business  such  as  interest,  collection  of  old  accounts,  divi- 
dends on  stock  owned,  etc. 

34.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  August  26,  1915,  p.  506. 

35.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  passim ;  Letter  Book  No.  57,  passim  ;  Letter  Book  No.  58, 
passim;  Letter  Book  No.  59,  passim;  interview  with  J.  E.  Davenport. 


284  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

The  buying  and  selling  of  wool  was  generally  handled  by 
G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  and  later  by  Frank  Bond.  However,  Bond 
&  Nohl  was  a  party  to  the  Bond-Warshauer  wool  agree- 
ment,36 and  while  outside  wool  activity  was  not  extensive, 
some  wool  profits  were  earned  as  revealed  in  Table  39. 

TABLE  39 
BOND  &  NOHL  WOOL  PROFITS 

Year  Amount 

1909   $7,003.69 

1910    1,852.47 

1911    2,916.92 

1912    6,411.85 

1913   .00 

1914   365.61 

1915    4,251.31 

Bond  &  Nohl  was  Frank  Bond's  sheep  trading  agency, 
but  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  owned  all  the  rented  sheep  except 
those  owned  by  the  other  stores.  Bond  &  Nohl  seems  to  have 
had  no  sheep  out  on  rent  with  partidarios.  On  the  other  hand, 
after  Bond  &  Nohl  was  organized  and  took  over  the  sheep 
trading  and  feeding  operations,  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  discon- 
tinued all  sheep  except  on  the  rental  side. 

All  sheep  trading  and  winter  feeding  was  carried  on  by 
Bond  &  Nohl  in  a  three-way  partnership  with  Fred  War- 
shauer  in  Antonito,  Colorado,  and  E.  S.  Leavenworth  in 
Wood  River,  Nebraska.  Under  the  terms  of  this  arrangement, 
Leavenworth  received  half  the  profits,  Warshauer  one-fourth, 
and  Bond  &  Nohl  one-fourth.37  Since  Frank  and  George  Bond 
each  owned  one-third  of  Bond  &  Nohl,  they  each  then  realized 
only  one-twelfth  of  the  profits  on  sheep.  Fred  Warshauer 
bought  all  his  sheep  for  joint  account  with  Bond  &  Nohl  and 
divided  his  profits  evenly  with  them,  so  the  Bonds  by  virtue 
of  their  ownership  each  received  one-sixth  of  the  profits  on 
Warshauer's  trading.38  Leavenworth  operated  the  feeding 
ranch  at  Wood  River,  Nebraska,  and  the  records  leave  no 

86.  Supra,  chap.  ill. 

37.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  September  19,  1910. 

38.  Ibid. 


FRANK   BOND  285 

indication  that  he  engaged  in  any  sheep  trading,  at  least 
insofar  as  the  Bonds  were  concerned. 

It  appears  that  the  Bond-Warshauer-Leavenworth  agree- 
ment did  not  come  into  existence  until  about  1908,  for  prior 
to  that  time  feeding  and  trading  accounts  were  maintained 
with  Corlett,  Everitt,  Leavenworth  alone,  Antonio  Lopez, 
L.  C.  Butscher,  and  Ed  Sargent.39  Fred  Warshauer  died  in 
1913,  and  Leavenworth's  health  broke  down  the  following 
year,  so  the  probable  period  of  the  agreement  appears  to 
have  been  from  1908  until  about  1913 ;  but  Bond  &  Nohl  con- 
tinued after  that  time  to  split  sheep  profits  with  the 
Warshauer-McClure  Sheep  Company,  dealing  then  with  Will 
McClure.40 

The  Bond  &  Nohl  sheep  profits  are  shown  in  Table  40 
for  the  period  through  1915.  In  order  to  approximate  the 
total  profits  on  sheep  trading  activities  after  giving  effect 
to  the  joint  agreements,  the  Bond  &  Nohl  profits  are  extended 
by  appropriate  factors. 

TABLE  40 

NET  PROFITS  ON  SHEEP  TRADING 
(even  dollars) 

Year  Bond  &  Nohl  Factor  Total 

Profits  Profits 

1906  $  8,149         2         $16,298 

1907  6,755         2          13,510 

1908  2,552         4          10,208 

1909  14,078         4          56,312 

1910  6,893         4          27,572 

1911  (2,714) «       4         (10,856) « 

1912  11,138         4         44,552 

1913  4,688         4          18,752 

1914  3,922         2          7,844 

1915  7,112         2          14,224 

a.  The  1911  loss  is  somewhat  open  to  question  because  it  results  from  the  fact  that 
the  profits  on  the  1911  lambs  sales  were  not  realized  until  1912  plus  the  inclusion  as  an 
expense  something  over  $5,000  in  unidentified  sheep  feeding  costs  that  possibly  should 
have  been  charged  to  the  feeding  accounts  rather  than  to  the  1911  sheep  schedule. 

The  handling  of  large  numbers  of  sheep  had  its  physical 
difficulties  as  well  as  the  problems  inherent  in  the  crude  mar- 

89.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

40.  Letter  Book  No.  53,  July  23,  1914,  p.  439. 


286  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ket  analysis  of  the  day  and  in  the  financing  of  sheep  trading. 
Sheep  were  trailed  from  their  origin  to  the  shipping  points 
where  they  were  loaded  into  freight  cars.  Up  to  the  turn  of 
the  century  sheep  trading  had  been  done  by  the  head,  but  the 
practice  changed  about  that  time  to  selling  them  by  weight,41 
so  the  sheep  had  to  be  weighed  as  well  as  counted  prior  to 
loading  them  aboard  the  cars.  For  these  purposes,  Bond  & 
Nohl  maintained  a  camp  house,  scale,42  and  loading  pens  at 
Servilleta  which  was  on  the  Denver  and  Rio  Grande  Railroad 
in  Taos  County  thirty-eight  miles  due  north  of  Espanola  and 
twenty-two  miles  northwest  of  Taos.43 

Frank  Bond  frequently  supervised  the  loading  operations 
personally,  arising  about  three  o'clock  in  the  morning  to  lead 
the  crews  himself.  He  is  clearly  remembered  for  the  furious 
pace  he  kept,  and  it  is  recalled  that  he  never  slowed  down 
all  day  long  below  a  fast  dogtrot.44  Loading  sheep  demanded 
advance  arrangements  with  the  railroad  to  have  cars  avail- 
able, and  these  arrangements  provide  us  with  the  only  indica- 
tion of  the  number  of  sheep  traded  by  Bond  &  Nohl.  In 
October,  1913,  the  requirement  was  for  thirty  railroad  cars 
per  day  at  the  Servilleta  shipping  point  for  three  successive 
days.  At  about  three  hundred  head  per  car,  this  one  shipment 
numbered  approximately  27,000  head  of  sheep — and  1913 
was  a  hard  year.45 

Handling  sheep  involved  other  difficulties  too.  Sheep  not 
only  have  more  different  kinds  of  parasites  than  any  other 
domestic  animal,  but  also  suffer  more  serious  effects  from 
them.  They  have  stomach  worms,  nodular  worms  in  the  in- 
testines, tapeworms,  flukes,  and  the  particularly  repulsive 
head  grubs  that  afflict  feeder  lambs.46  New  Mexico  was  par- 
ticularly honored  with  a  disease  known  as  the  trembles  or 

41.  Wentworth,  op.  eft.,  p.  362.  Pricing  and  selling  was  by  weight ;  contracting  was 
done  by  the  head  but  with  restrictions  as  to  maximum,  minimum,  and  average  weights. 

42.  Two  Fairbanks-Morse  scales   of  six  tons   capacity   each.   Letter  Book  No.   58, 
December  3,  1914,  p.  203. 

48.  U.  S.,  Department  of  the  Interior,  G.  L.  O.,  Map  of  Territory  of  New  Mexico. 
1908. 

44.  Interview  with  John  F.  McCarthy,  Taos,  New  Mexico,  January  10,  1958. 

45.  Letter  Book  No.  SO,  October  11,  1913,  p.  40;  ibid.,  October  16,  1913,  p.  81 :  ibid., 
October  20,  1913,  p.  105. 

46.  Wentworth,  op.  eit.,  p.  463. 


FRANK  BOND  287 

alkaline  disease  that  was  caused  by  eating  goldenrod.47  Sore 
lips,  too,  were  a  source  of  worry,  and  in  1914  more  than  900 
of  Bond's  sheep  on  feed  in  Nebraska  were  afflicted,  with  some 
losses.48  In  addition  to  these  parasites,  there  was  foot-rot 
which  reached  its  climax  in  1906  and  scab,  or  mange,  which 
is  the  widest  spread,  oldest,  and  most  prevalent  of  all  sheep 
diseases.  This  malady,  that  results  not  only  in  shedding  of 
wool  but  also  in  death  to  the  animal,  was  not  effectively  con- 
trolled until  about  the  turn  of  the  century  when  the  use  of 
nicotine  or  lime-sulphur  dips  was  found  to  be  effective.49 

The  New  Mexico  Sheep  Sanitary  Board,  organized  in 
1897,  established  and  maintained  scab  control  in  New  Mex- 
ico, and  in  1899  Solomon  F.  Luna  of  Los  Lunas,  W.  S.  Prager 
of  Roswell,  and  Harry  F.  Lee  of  San  Mateo  were  elected  presi- 
dent, vice-president,  and  secretary,  respectively.  At  the  same 
time,  fifty  inspectors  were  appointed  with  the  duty  of  in- 
specting every  flock  in  their  county  annually  and  with  the 
power  to  quarantine  infected  sheep  and  inspect  all  incoming 
and  outgoing  sheep.  G.  W.  Bond,  then  in  Wagon  Mound,  and 
Frank  Bond  in  Espanola,  were  among  these  inspectors,50  and 
since  this  was  mostly  an  actual  working  job,  additional  duties 
devolved  upon  the  brothers,  not  only  in  the  nature  of  a  public 
service  but  also  in  the  interest  of  protecting  their  own  flocks. 

In  1904  all  the  sheep  in  the  Territory  were  ordered 
dipped,  the  U.  S.  Department  of  Agriculture  threatened  a 
general  quarantine  of  New  Mexico,51  and  general  dipping 
orders  were  then  issued  as  necessary.  Bond  &  Nohl  did  not 
support  the  cost  of  dipping  the  flocks  of  their  customers,  nor 
indeed  did  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  pay  for  dipping  their  sheep 
on  rent.  This  was  the  individual  flockmaster's  responsi- 
bility.52 However,  they  did,  upon  request  of  the  inspectors, 
order  the  necessary  materials — sulphur  from  Gross-Kelly  and 
lime  from  the  state  penitentiary  at  Santa  Fe.53  There  were 

47.  Ibid. 

48.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  December  31.  1914.  p.  418. 

49.  Wentworth,  op.  eft.,  pp.  448-457. 

50.  Ibid.,  pp.  458-459. 

51.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  August  23,  1904,  p.  82. 

52.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  March  30,  1915,  p.  485. 

63.  Ibid.,  March  23,  1915,  p.  487. 


288  NEW    MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

other  minor  chores  for  Bond  too.  In  order  to  reach  the  nearest 
dipping  plant,  the  flocks  sometimes  had  to  cross  National 
Forest  Land,  and  so  Bond  usually  arranged  for  the  necessary 
crossing  permits.54  After  1909,  however,  Bond  &  Nohl  owned 
and  operated  their  own  sheep  dipping  plant  at  Espanola.55 

Last,  but  not  least  of  the  sheepman's  woes  was  the 
weather.  The  hard  winter  of  1914-1915  cost  the  growers 
about  30  per  cent  of  the  ewes  in  the  Espanola  area.  Bond  lost 
1,777  sheep  in  Sandoval  county  and  1,500  more  as  far  south 
as  Bernalillo  County.  The  vast  Navajo  country  to  the  west 
was  hard  hit  too.  John  Davenport  estimated  that  losses  in 
the  area  north  of  Cabezon  might  run  upwards  of  10,000,  and 
Frank  Bond  had  Walter  Connell  privately  look  into  the  pos- 
sibility of  buying  up  the  sheep  pelts  that  would  result.56 

Normal  sheep  trading  contemplated  buying  sheep  and 
lambs  in  the  spring  and  selling  them  in  the  fall  at  a  profit, 
both  purchase  and  sale  being  started  in  the  spring  and  con- 
tinuing in  diminishing  degree  through  the  summer.  Sheep 
received  in  the  fall  were  immediately  shipped  out  to  the 
buyers,  but  it  was  also  frequently  profitable  to  hold  lambs 
over,  fatten  them  on  feed  during  the  winter  months,  and  sell 
them  early  the  following  year.  Indeed,  winter  feeding  was 
a  very  important  operation  in  the  Bond  scheme  of  things. 

The  earliest  positive  indication  of  sheep  being  fed  during 
the  winter  was  at  the  end  of  1894  when  the  Wagon  Mound 
store  had  sheep  on  feed  at  Ft.  Collins,  Colorado.  However, 
G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  had  a  very  small  sheep  investment  at  the 
end  of  1893  which,  being  at  the  end  of  December,  must  have 
represented  sheep  on  feed  although  probably  not  in  formal 
feed  lots.  As  early  as  1902  sheep  were  being  fed  with  C.  B. 
Reynolds  in  Nebraska,  and  during  the  winter  of  1906-1907 
Bond  &  Nohl  fed  sheep  jointly  with  four  others.  The  follow- 

54.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  August  11,  1915,  p.  379. 

55.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

56.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  March  9,  1915,  p.  311;  ibid.,  April  28,  1915,  p.  700;  Letter 
Book  No.  58,  May  18,  1915,  p.  169 ;  Letter  Book  No.  59,  Augrust  7,  1915,  p.  340. 

Sheep  losses  in  New  Mexico  were  reported  to  have  been  as  high  as  40  per  cent  during 
the  winter  of  1904-1905,  and  the  editor  of  The  American  Shepherd's  Bulletin  was  highly 
critical  of  sheep  handling  in  the  state.  He  commented : 

"It  .  .  .  [the]  sheep  owners  would  try  the  experiment  of  providing  adequate  feed  and 
shelter  for  their  flocks,  the  result  might  be  very  interesting."  The  American  Shepherd's 
Bulletin,  X,  No.  4  (April,  1905),  394  (18). 


FRANK  BOND  289 

ing  year  they  had  their  first  joint  feeding  account  with  E.  S. 
Leavenworth. 

In  1909  the  Bonds  acquired  a  270-acre  ranch  at  Wood 
River,  Nebraska,  for  winter  sheep  feeding,57  but  the  invest- 
ment was  carried  on  Frank  Bond's  personal  books  and  not 
by  Bond  &  Nohl  even  though  the  latter  was  Frank  Bond's 
feeding  agency.  During  these  years  Bond  &  Nohl  fed  sheep 
at  Wood  River  with  four  men — E.  S.  Leavenworth,  W.  C. 
Scott,  H.  M.  Russell,  and  H.  S.  Eaton.  Wood  River,  however, 
was  being  used  extensively  by  New  Mexico  sheep  men  for 
winter  feeding  long  before  the  Bonds  bought  their  ranch 
there ;  11,500  head  were  shipped  out  of  Santa  Fe  in  Novem- 
ber, 1904,  for  the  feed  lots  in  Wood  River,58  but  the  extent 
to  which  Bond  participated  in  Wood  River  feeding  at  that 
time  is  undisclosed. 

In  addition  to  the  ranch  property,  other  feed  lots  were 
rented  from  the  Dawson  County  National  Bank  in  Lexington, 
Nebraska,  for  the  modest  sum  of  fifty  dollars  a  year.59  These 
were  the  lots  used  by  H.  M.  Russell  where  in  1914-1915  he  fed 
8,801  sheep  and  19  goats. 

The  winter  of  1914-1915  was  typical  of  winter  feeding 
even  though  it  was  by  no  means  the  biggest.  Indeed,  in 
August  Frank  Bond  indicated  that  he  would  not  feed  many 
sheep  that  winter  because  he  feared  that  prices  would  drop 
after  the  war.  The  United  States  had  not  yet  been  drawn 
into  the  war,  and  the  general  opinion  in  northern  New  Mex- 
ico was  that  the  war  would  not  last  more  than  three  months, 
or  six  months  at  the  outside.  But  Bond  did  feel  that  if  the  war 
lasted  until  after  the  sheep  market  in  the  spring,  feeding 
could  be  profitable.  The  belief  that  it  would  in  fact  last  must 
have  developed  for  he  did  finally  feed  about  28,000  head  of 
sheep  in  Nebraska  that  winter.60 

Clay,  Robinson  and  Company  was  a  livestock  commission 

57.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  March  16,  1910. 

58.  "The  largest  shipment  of  sheep  that  ever  left  Santa  Fe  at  one  time  was  sent  to 
Wood  River,  Neb.,  Nov.  7,  [1904]  over  the  Denver  &  Rio  Grande.  They  were  driven  into 
the  city  and  filled  36  cars,  being  7,000  in  number.  About  4,500  more  head  were  driven 
over  the  Santa  Fe  Central  for  the  same  destination  the  next  day,  coming  from  Estancia." 
The  American  Shepherd's  Bulletin,  IX,  No.  12    (December,  1904),  1306    (98). 

59.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  August  81,  1915,  p.  545. 

60.  Letter  Book  No.  55,  August  25,  1914,  p.  7  ;  ibid.,  October  21,  1914,  p.  625. 


290  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

firm  in  Denver,  operated  by  John  Clay,  Charles  H.  Robinson, 
and  William  H.  Forrest,  which  began  discounting  livestock 
paper  with  the  First  National  Bank  of  Chicago  not  long  after 
the  Bonds  came  to  New  Mexico  and  through  which  Frank 
Bond  financed  much  of  his  winter  feeding.61  In  order  to 
finance  his  feeding  in  the  winter  of  1914,  Bond  borrowed 
$65,000  from  that  firm  at  9  per  cent  interest62  and  agreed  to 
ship  them  all  the  sheep  on  feed  the  following  spring.  The 
notes  securing  feeding  advances  were  signed  by  the  feeder, 
but  Bond  endorsed  them.  They  were  paid  in  sheep,  the  note 
being  credited  with  each  shipment  until  they  were  paid.  Sub- 
sequent credits  were  deposited  directly  to  the  Bond  &  Nohl 
account  in  the  Pueblo  Bank.63 

The  feeding  with  H.  M.  Russell  and  W.  C.  Scott  in  1914 
was  divided  into  thirds — equal  interests  being  held  by  Bond 
&  Nohl,  the  Warshauer-McClure  Sheep  Company,  and  the 
G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  Mercantile  Company  in  Encino.  The 
Leavenworth  feeding  was  shared  in  by  Bond  &  Nohl  for  only 
one-sixth,  an  equal  share  being  held  by  Warshauer-McClure, 
and  a  two-thirds  interest  by  E.  S.  Leavenworth  who  had 
11,000  sheep  on  feed.64 

Feeding  large  flocks  of  sheep  during  the  winter  was  ex- 
pensive,65 and  it  required  careful  attention  to  matters  of 
purchasing  corn,  prairie  hay,  or  alfalfa  to  feed  them.  Indeed, 
buying  feed  could  easily  make  the  difference  between  profit 
and  loss  on  the  winter  gamble.66  For  these  purchases  the 

61.  Wentworth,  op.  eft.,  p.  439. 

62.  Bond  protested  that  this  rate  was  too  high  in  view  of  the  size  of  his  feeding 
operation.  He  asked  Clay,  Robinson  &  Co.  for  7  per  cent  money  and  the  following  year 
they  did  even  better  than  that,  offering  feeding  advances  at  6  per  cent.  Letter  Book  No. 
57,  February  8,  1915,  p.  13  ;  Letter  Book  No.  59,  p.  472. 

63.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  February  17,  1915,  p.  159. 

64.  Letter  Book  No.  55,  October  21,  1914,  p.  625 ;  Letter  Book  No.  56,  December  4. 
1914,  p.  214.  Inviting  C.  J.  Stauder  in  Fowler,  Colorado,  to  feed  with  him,  Bond  outlined 
the  arrangements  at  the  working  level : 

"We  have  feeding  accounts  with  several  parties.  They  put  in  their  time  at  $50.00  per 
month  and  work  the  same  as  the  hired  men,  and  we  furnish  the  sheep  and  the  money 
to  feed  them  with  and  give  them  15  per  cent  of  the  profits,  they  stand  no  losses,  in  case 
there  is  a  loss  made."Z,etter  Book  No.  55,  October  16,  1914,  p.  509. 

66.  Bond  estimated  that  it  took  about  $80,000  to  pay  for  and  feed  14,000  sheep.  Ibid., 
October  14,  1914,  p.  486. 

66.  At  one  time  Leavenworth  suggested  buying  another  80  acres  at  Wood  River 
which  would  be  used  to  raise  alfalfa,  but  nothing  was  ever  done  about  it.  Letter  Book 
No.  6,  March  16,  1910. 


FRANK  BOND  291 

feeder  wrote  checks  as  necessary  against  an  account  replen- 
ished by  Bond  &  Nohl,  and  these  were  charged  to  his  feeding 
account.67  In  this  way  it  was  possible  for  Bond  to  know  quite 
accurately  what  the  feeder  was  or  was  not  doing.  An  example 
of  this  type  of  management  control  is  encountered  in  1914 
when  Bond  had  sheep  on  feed  with  W.  C.  Scott.  Observing 
the  charges  that  were  made  to  the  feeding  account,  he  noted 
that  Scott  was  lagging  in  his  feed  purchases.  Bond  launched 
an  incessant  round  of  exhortations  in  an  effort  to  get  Scott 
to  buy  his  feed.  It  proved  such  a  source  of  aggravation  that 
after  Scott's  account  was  closed  in  the  spring  Bond  discon- 
tinued feeding  with  him  for  good  even  though  the  account 
netted  over  $5,000  and  Bond  himself  was  quite  satisfied  with 
the  showing.68 

This  was  also  the  last  winter  of  feeding  with  Leaven- 
worth.  His  health  had  been  worsening  for  some  time  and 
Bond  was  so  concerned  about  the  matter  that  he  paid  Rus- 
sell's expenses  and  had  him  go  visit  Leavenworth  on  a  pretext 
to  see  just  how  serious  it  was.69  Frank  was  now  determined 
to  sell  the  Wood  River  ranch,  for  which  he  asked  $36,450,™ 
but  it  was  still  on  the  books  at  the  close  of  1915. 

The  year-end  balances  of  sheep  on  feed  are  outlined  in 
Table  41,  and  the  peak  years  of  feeding  are  revealed  to  be 
1908  and  1911.  In  1908  Bond  and  Warshauer  fed  over  $100,- 
000  worth  of  sheep  with  Leavenworth  and  slightly  more  with 
L.  C.  Butscher.  The  feeding  partners  in  1911,  when  the  in- 
vestment reached  a  peak  of  $282,615,  are  not  disclosed,  but 
undoubtedly  the  major  parts  were  handled  by  Leavenworth, 
Russell,  and  Scott.  Since  the  feeding  accounts  represent  not 
only  the  cost  of  sheep  but  also  the  feeding  expense  incurred, 
no  attempt  is  made  to  interpret  these  investment  data  in 
terms  of  heads  of  sheep  on  hand. 

On  the  mercantile  side  of  Bond  &  Nohl,  salaries  accounted 
for  the  largest  expense  of  the  business,  averaging  between 
$10,000  and  $14,000  a  year.  Based  on  the  general  salaries  in 

67.  Letter  Book  No.  55,  October  12,  1914,  p.  466. 

68.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  June  1,  1915,  p.  353 ;  ibid.,  June  11,  1915,  p.  461 ;  ibid., 
May  19.  1915,  p.  186  ;  ibid.,  June  1,  1915,  p.  336. 

69.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  January  21,  1915,  p.  561. 

70.  Letter  Book  No.  SO,  October  6,  1913 ;  Letter  Book  No.  SI,  March  11,  1914,  p.  428. 


292  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

TABLE  41 

BOND  &  NOHL  SHEEP  FEEDING  ACCOUNTS 
(even  dollars) 

End  of  Year  Amount 

1906  $  4,319 

1907  19,381 

1908  222,608 

1909  97,515 

1910  102,803 

1911  282,615 

1912  87,313 

1913  31,596 

1914  125,549 

1915  100,335 

effect,  this  probably  represented  about  ten  or  twelve  em- 
ployees. Salary  levels  are  illustrated  by  that  paid  to  Walter 
Connell  in  1914  who  was  employed  as  a  manager  in  Albu- 
querque at  $75  per  month,  the  estimate  for  his  stenographic 
help  being  $25  per  month.71  In  the  same  year,  however,  Bond 
indicated  to  J.  H.  McCarthy  at  Taos  that  $100  per  month 
was  a  fair  salary  for  a  bookkeeper. 

Bond  &  Nohl  kept  a  male  stenographer  in  the  office  to  take 
care  of  the  voluminous  correspondence  necessary  to  the 
business  as  well  as  to  serve  Frank  Bond.  Clerks  also  were 
necessary  in  the  store,  and  care  was  taken  to  see  that  one  or 
two  of  them  were  natives.72  In  addition  to  a  manager,  book- 
keeper, stenographer,  and  clerks,  it  was  necessary  to  employ 
general  handymen,  warehouse  clerks,  laborers,  and  an  assist- 
ant manager  of  sorts  to  handle  collections,  act  as  general  fore- 
man and  trusted  lieutenant.  This  latter  position  was  occupied 
for  many  years  by  Leandro  Martinez  who  left  in  1913, 73  but 
he  was  replaced  by  John  E.  Davenport,  whose  father,  Clar- 
ence E.  Davenport,  had  been  associated  with  the  Bonds  in  the 
Forbes  Wool  Company  in  Trinidad  and  later  with  the  G.  W. 
Bond  &  Bro.  Mercantile  Company  in  Encino.  This  position 
was  generally  known  as  "outside  man"  and  included  the  area 
of  responsibility  associated  with  inspecting  sheep,  buying 

71.  Letter  Book  No.  S3,  July  17,  1914,  p.  382. 

72.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  March  10,  1915,  p.  319. 
78.  Letter  Book  No.  SO,  December  19,  1913,  p.  599. 


FRANK  BOND  293 

from  the  growers,  receiving  sheep,  contracting  for  wool,  and 
similar  functions. 

Employees  were  treated  fairly,  but  by  no  means  lavishly. 
In  1909  the  stenographer  was  paid  $75  a  month  with  the 
promise  of  more  if  he  would  learn  Spanish.  Bookkeepers  and 
stenographers  were  usually  recruited  from  out  of  town,  but 
the  prospective  employee  paid  his  own  moving  expenses.74 
Hours  were  long  for  the  store  employees,  the  store  usually 
being  open  six  days  a  week  and  closing  at  ten  o'clock  in  the 
evening.75 

The  Bond  secretaries  undoubtedly  earned  their  salaries 
in  full  for  Frank  Bond  was  a  prolific  correspondent  and  like- 
wise expected  others  to  be.  He  maintained  a  strict  policy  of 
answering  letters  promptly,  and  the  following  quotations 
make  his  position  on  the  matter  perfectly  clear : 

When  I  write  you  about  any  matter  requiring  an  answer 
I  expect  you  to  sit  down  and  answer  that  letter  that  same  eve- 
ning of  the  day  you  receive  the  letter,  so  that  I  will  get  an 
answer  promptly.  It  takes  no  longer  to  answer  it  ...  than  it 
does  a  week  or  ten  days  from  then.  .  .  .  Every  letter  we  get  is 
answered  in  the  very  next  mail  and  if  we  are  going  to  continue 
to  do  business  together,  I  surely  want  you  to  adopt  this  as  one 
of  your  rules,  as  there  is  nothing  more  annoying  to  me  than 
to  have  a  man  fail  to  answer  my  letters  promptly,  in  fact 
rather  than  continually  be  annoyed  this  way,  I  would  stop 
doing  business  with  him.76 

and  again : 

If  [business  letters]  are  not  answered  immediately,  it  shows 
that  the  party  receiving  them  is  very  sloppy  in  his  methods  of 
doing  business.  If  a  man  is  in  business  and  is  too  sick  to  answer 
letters  he  should  have  one  of  his  men  answer  them.  If  you  had 
no  intention  of  answering  my  letters,  I  surely  intended  to  get 
in  touch  with  somebody  who  would,  even  if  I  had  to  hire  him. 
There  is  nothing  this  side  of  heaven  or  hell  that  annoys  me 
more  than  to  have  a  man  fail  to  answer  a  letter  in  which  I 
have  asked  him  for  a  little  information  that  would  take  him 
less  than  two  minutes  to  write  me.  You  say  you  have  done  the 


74.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  August  31,  1909. 

75.  Interview  with  John  F.  McCarthy. 

76.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  January  20,  1915,  p.  540. 


294  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

best  you  could  under  the  circumstances.  I  want  to  say  to  you 
that  if  I  should  get  a  business  letter  from  you,  a  letter  asking 
for  information,  no  matter  how  sick  I  was  somebody  would 
answer  that  letter  in  the  next  mail  or  that  somebody  would 
be  very  sorry  he  had  not  attended  to  it.  ...  I  certainly  hope 
that  you  will  sit  down  and  answer  my  letters  the  day  you  get 
them  provided  they  require  an  answer.  ...  I  presume  you 
will  regard  this  as  a  very  mean  letter,  it  is  not  however  I  as- 
sure you  I  merely  wish  to  impress  on  you  that  you  have 
annoyed  me  very  much.  Why  add  to  my  burdens?  I  have  at 
times  tried  to  lighten  yours,  and  you  know  that  mine  is  not  a 
path  of  roses.  I  have  a  whole  lot  on  my  mind  all  the  time. 
Understand  that  I  am  always  your  friend  and  always  will  be 
if  you  will  allow  me  to  be.77 

That  Frank  Bond  practiced  his  own  philosophy  is  clear. 
Whenever  he  was  absent  on  a  trip,  which  was  frequently, 
Louis  Nohl  replied  to  all  correspondence  received.  If  it  was  a 
matter  upon  which  Nohl  was  not  in  a  position  to  act,  the 
letter  was  answered  anyway,  advising  the  correspondent  that 
Bond  was  out  of  town  and  that  his  letter  would  be  handed  to 
him  upon  his  return.  Office  correspondence  was  in  all  cases 
promptly  attended  to,  and  Nohl  even  worked  on  Christmas 
Day,  1914,  writing  seven  letters.  Bond  was  equally  energetic 
and  once,  after  a  six-week  absence  in  California,  he  had 
caught  up  on  all  his  mail  the  day  after  his  return.78 

Selection  of  responsible  personnel  was  made  very  care- 
fully. In  considering  one  candidate  for  employment,  Frank 
Bond  asked  A.  H.  Long: 

What  do  you  know  about  [him]  ?  How  does  he  impress  you?  Is 
he  honest?  Does  he  speak  Spanish?  Would  you  want  him  for 
an  outside  man?  Would  you  consider  him  so  valuable  that  you 
would  be  willing  to  give  him  an  interest  in  the  business  in 
order  to  get  him?  Does  he  drink?  How  old  is  he?  Is  he  a 
worker?  Has  he  got  any  money  of  his  own?  Is  he  moral?  Is  he 
married?  Is  he  healthy?  Of  ordinary  intelligence?  Know  some- 
thing about  stock?  Experience  in  trading?  Can  we  absolutely 
trust  him?  Is  he  interested  in  making  good?  79 


77.  Ibid.,  p.  542. 

78.  Ibid.,  December  25,  1914,  p.  369;  Letter  Book  No.  57,  April  6,  1916,  p.  5S7: 
Letter  Book  No.  58,  passim. 

79.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  May  25,  1916,  p.  287. 


FRANK  BOND  295 

George  Bond  was  a  teetotaler  himself  and  was  opposed  to 
drinking  by  others.  Consequently,  Frank  Bond  always 
checked  out  a  prospect's  drinking  habits  even  though  he 
didn't  feel  as  strongly  about  the  matter.  Frank  did,  however, 
depend  almost  entirely  on  the  results  of  his  own  inquiries  as 
he  felt  that  in  general  letters  of  recommendation  were  cheap 
with  most  men.  On  the  other  hand,  his  references  were 
entirely  honest  and  candid.  If  the  individual  deserved  a 
good  reference,  he  got  one.80  If  not,  the  following  example 
illustrates : 

He  may  have  reformed,  but  we  would  not  do  business  with 
him  again  under  any  circumstances,  nor  would  we  care  to  wish 
him  on  our  worst  enemy.  Unless  he  has  reformed,  his  business 
is  women,  wine,  and  cards;  on  the  side  buys  a  few  sheep  and 
cattle  with  some  unfortunate's  money.81 

Bond  was  ever  interested  in  affording  opportunities  for 
deserving  men  to  enter  the  organization,  and  although  the 
managers'  salaries  were  usually  small  in  relation  to  those  of 
the  other  employees,  he  felt  that  the  salaries  were  not  sup- 
posed to  be  of  any  great  importance,  expecting  them  to  make 
their  money  out  of  the  profits  of  the  business.82  Quite  beyond 
the  obvious  advantage  of  acquiring  an  interest  in  a  business, 
the  managers  were  permitted  to  maintain  large  personal  ac- 
counts with  the  company  completely  interest-free.83  Nohl's 
account,  for  instance,  started  at  a  modest  $1,800  and  grew 
steadily  so  that  by  the  end  of  1915  it  had  swelled  to  more  than 
$30,000.84 

At  the  suggestion  of  George  Bond  in  1914,  the  matter  of 
bonding  the  company  employees  was  introduced  for  the  first 
time,  and  a  decision  was  made  to  bond  the  bookkeepers  of  all 
the  stores  for  $25,000  each.85  This  practice  was  adopted,  but 
the  bookkeeper  in  Taos  objected  to  being  bonded.  The  re- 
action was  swift.  Frank  Bond  wrote  McCarthy : 

80.  Letter  Book  No.  55,  October  17,  1914,  p.  525. 

81.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  July  30,  1915,  p.  269. 

82.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  June  14,  1915,  p.  529. 

83.  Letter  Book  No.  50,  October  16,  1913,  p.  83. 

84.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

85.  Letter  Book  No.  53,  August  21,  1914,  p.  685. 


296  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

If  he  doesn't  want  to  give  a  bond  just  simply  fire  him  and 
tell  him  that  I  said  so,  and  I  want  you  to  do  it  right  quick.  An 
honest  man  should  not  hesitate  to  be  under  bond,  seeing  that 
we  are  paying  for  the  bond,  and  the  fact  that  he  doesn't  seem 
to  want  to  give  a  bond,  does  not  look  good  to  me.86 

In  addition  to  the  expenses  just  discussed,  there  appeared 
other  important  expense  items  in  1911  and  1912  when  $15,000 
and  $20,000  were  charged  off  to  cover  losses  of  the  Espanola 
Milling  and  Elevator  Company.87  These  write-offs  account 
for  the  sharp  drop  in  net  profits  for  those  years  which  may  be 
observed  in  Table  42,  and  a  poor  year  for  sheep  and  wool  is 
largely  responsible  for  the  depressed  profit  in  1913. 

As  might  be  expected  in  a  business  of  this  type,  receiv- 
ables were  high.  In  contrast  to  the  stores  where  sheep  and 
wool  were  combined  with  the  mercantile  business,  Bond  & 
Nohl  held  the  heaviest  investment  in  personal  accounts,  with 
bills  receivable  considerably  lower.  These  are  shown  in  Table 
43.  Personal  accounts  were  conservatively  valued  for  state- 
ment presentation  at  85  or  90  per  cent  of  good  value,  although 
after  1909  it  was  the  general  practice  to  deduct  only  those 
accounts  actually  expected  to  be  uncollectible.  While  these 
were  always  considerably  below  10  per  cent,  the  actual  loss 
experience  was  so  small  as  to  make  even  these  valuations 
highly  conservative. 

TABLE  43 

BOND  &  NOHL  MAJOR  RECEIVABLES 
(dollars  in  thousands) 

Year  Bills  Receivable  Personal 

Accounts  (Gross) 

1906  $  3.3          $40.4 

1907  29.0  42.2 

1908  15.4  51.0 

1909  20.7  36.9 

1910  19.1  45.4 

1911  16.3  56.1 

1912  13.4  62.1 

1913  13.2  52.7 

1914  31.9  52.1 

1915  9.8  56.9 


86.  Letter  Book  No.  55,  September  7,  1914.  p.  142. 

87.  Infra,  chap.  xi. 


FRANK   BOND 


297 


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298  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Through  1913  the  Real  Estate  investment  of  Bond  &  Nohl 
was  slightly  over  $14,000.  However,  on  May  25,  1914,  the 
entire  store  and  contents  burned  to  the  ground.  Always  great 
believers  in  insurance,  Bond  formerly  had  carried  only  75  per 
cent  coverage,  but  since  the  insurance  company  had  allowed 
him  to  carry  full  insurance,  this  had  been  done.88  As  a  result, 
the  fire  loss  to  the  business  was  very  small  as  illustrated  by 
Table  44. 

TABLE  44 

BOND  &  NOHL  FIRE,  MAY  25,  1914 

Item  Value  at  Time  Claim  Loss 

of  Fire  Paid* 

Stock  $40,000  $38,000  $2,000 

Building  10,000  10,000  0 

Furniture  &  Fixtures                  4,600  3,500  1,000 

Total  $54,500  $51,500  $3,000 

a.  By  the  Liverpool  &  London  &  Globe  Insurance  Company. 

Bond  immediately  made  plans  for  reconstruction,  antici- 
pating a  new  building  with  steam  heat,  electric  lights,  water, 
and  inside  toilets.  The  new  store  was  to  be  truly  worthy  of 
the  competition  springing  up  in  Espanola,  for  there  were  at 
least  six  new  ones  in  progress  at  that  time.  The  new  building 
contract  was  let  to  F.  W.  Schnauf  er,  and  by  the  latter  part  of 
August  construction  was  actually  under  way ;  the  dry  goods 
and  shoe  departments  moved  into  the  new  building  on  No- 
vember 1,  1914.  This  new  edifice  on  the  Espanola  scene  was 
of  concrete  and  measured  125  feet  wide  by  95  feet  long.  There 
were  three  large  rooms,  one  behind  the  other;  the  middle 
room  was  35  feet  deep  and  125  feet  wide  and  the  other  two 
were  about  25  feet  deep  and  of  the  same  width.  Although  the 
building  had  a  fifteen-foot  ceiling,  the  front  and  rear  rooms 
had  fourteen-foot  ceilings.  In  the  store  section  there  were 
three  dark  oak  counters  measuring  28  inches  wide  and  37^ 
feet  long,  covered  with  linoleum.  Frank  Bond  ordered  a 
knocked-down  dressing  room  for  the  furnishings  department, 
but  he  had  some  difficulty  with  it  upon  arrival  due  to  the  fact 
that  it  was  designed  for  corner  installation  and  there  was  no 
corner  for  it.  There  was  an  engine  and  boiler  house  complete 

88.  Letter  Book  No.  53,  June  28,  1914,  p.  99 ;  ibid.,  June  29,  1914,  p.  170. 


FRANK  BOND  299 

with  a  five  kilowatt,  115-volt,  direct  current  Fairbanks-Morse 
dynamo  for  operating  the  new  electric  lights,  and  a  boiler  to 
operate  the  steam  radiators  in  the  building.  A  coal  house  was 
provided  to  store  the  coal  which  was  bought  by  the  carload 
and  used  by  the  carload  too  for  that  matter.  In  the  winter 
of  1914-1915  a  forty-ton  car  of  coal  lasted  less  than  two 
months.89 

A  number  of  other  assets  appeared  briefly  on  the  books  of 
Bond  &  Nohl  from  time  to  time,  reflecting  the  varied  activi- 
ties of  the  home  store.  Frequently,  of  course,  these  repre- 
sented personal  investments  of  Frank  Bond  rather  than  of 
the  mercantile  store,  it  frequently  being  the  vehicle  for  carry- 
ing out  his  own  business  transactions.  In  1907,  for  instance, 
almost  $11,000  was  shown  as  a  receivable  from  Fred  War- 
shauer.  Commencing  in  1908  and  continuing  through  1913  a 
small  account  was  carried  for  the  Espanola  Bridge.  No  ex- 
planation of  this  $1,000  item  has  been  found.  Similarly, 
somewhat  less  than  $1,000  was  invested  in  1907  in  the  camp 
house  and  scale  at  Servilleta  and  maintained  continuously 
throughout  the  period.  In  addition,  about  $3,500  was  invested 
in  a  sheep  dipping  plant  in  Espanola  in  1911,  along  with  the 
necessary  corrals.  There  was  a  small  school  warrant  account, 
and  a  windmill.90 

Some  of  these  extraneous  items  on  the  books  are  minor  in 
amount  and  transitory  in  nature,  and  the  usage  of  the  ac- 
counts appears  to  have  varied  considerably  from  year  to  year. 

All  the  sheep  trading  and  feeding  in  addition  to  the  mer- 
cantile business  would,  of  course,  have  severely  taxed  the 
company  had  not  George  and  Frank  Bond  provided  consid- 
erable financial  support.  A  considerable  part  of  this  financial 
strength  was  derived  from  the  undivided  profits.  With  a 
minor  exception  in  1914,91  the  net  profits  were  returned  to 
surplus  every  year.92  Together  with  the  sums  contributed  by 

89.  Letter  Book  No.  S3,  June  15,  1914 ;  Letter  Book  No.  55,  August  28,  1914,  p.  B3 ; 
ibid.,  November  1,  1914,  p.  643  ;  ibid.,  p.  680 ;  Letter  Book  No.  56,  November  14,  1914, 
p.  54  ;  ibid.,  December  2,  1914,  p.  188  ;  ibid.,  February  6,  1915,  p.  698  ;  Letter  Book  No.  58, 
June  7,  1915,  p.  454 ;  ibid.,  June  27,  1915,  p.  630 ;  Letter  Book  No.  59,  September  1,  1915, 
p.  576  ;  ibid.,  September  4,  1915,  p.  622. 

90.  Records,  loc.  eit. 

91.  There  was  a  withdrawal  of  $4,700  in  1914. 

92.  Cf .,  Tables  42  and  45. 


300  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

the  Bonds  separately  and  apart  from  the  capital  stock  they 
provide  an  explanation  of  how  such  heavy  investments  could 
be  carried  by  a  general  mercantile  store  without  seriously 
endangering  its  financial  position.  These  totals  are  shown  in 
Table  45. 

Although  Louis  Nohl  was  manager  of  the  Espanola  store 
and  was  directly  responsible  for  making  it  show  a  profit  much 
in  the  same  manner  as  were  the  other  store  managers,  he  was 
in  close  proximity  to  Frank  Bond's  strong  influence  and  no 
doubt  this  business  was  operated  more  in  consonance  with  the 
Bond  philosophy  than  any  other. 

Several  merchandising  points  followed  by  Bond  &  Nohl 
are  therefore  noteworthy,  and  it  is  of  interest  to  discover  that 
various  means  were  utilized  to  deliver  items  to  customers  in 
the  commerce  of  the  day.  There  is  no  indication  that  any  local 
delivery  of  items  was  carried  on  within  the  Espanola  area, 
but  some  pains  were  taken  to  get  commodities  to  out-of-town 

TABLE  45 

BOND  &  NOHL  CAPITAL 
(dollars  in  thousands) 

Year  Capital  Undivided  Due  G.  W.  or  Total 

Stock  Profits  Frank  Bond 

1906  $50.0       $  18.5       $  39.3       $107.8 

1907  50.0  34.6  65.0  149.6 

1908  50.0  47.3  254.8  352.1 

1909  50.0  76.7  150.4  277.1 

1910  50.0  97.1  137.0  284.1 

1911  50.0  100.5  318.7  469.2 

1912  50.0  108.7  111.5  270.2 

1913  50.0  117.3  31.0  198.3 

1914  50.0  125.6  36.2  211.8 

1915  50.0  137.4  26.0  213.4 

customers.  At  least  one  case  is  on  record  where  a  lady  in 
Buckman  received  her  regular  supply  of  butter  by  the  simple 
expedient  of  having  the  train  conductor  deliver  it  to  her. 
Following  a  more  modern  merchandising  trend,  an  order  was 
placed  in  May,  1915,  on  the  Hinkle-Leadstone  Company  in 
Chicago  for  500  premium  catalogues  and  a  supply  of  coupons 


FRANK  BOND  301 

and  certificates,  both  in  English  and  in  Spanish.  The  inscrip- 
tion on  the  back  of  the  catalogue  is  the  only  instance  of  ad- 
vertising by  Bond  &  Nohl  that  has  been  observed.93  The  A. 
MacArthur  Company  in  Wagon  Mound  is  known  to  have  ad- 
vertised in  the  local  newspaper,  El  Combate,  but  this  was  a 
Spanish  language  advertisement.  Since  Bond  &  Nohl  or- 
dered their  catalogues  furnished  in  both  languages,  the  back 
was  probably  printed  in  Spanish  on  those  copies  also.  The 
wording  provides  us  with  an  excellent  description  of  the  Bond 
&  Nohl  business,  but  with  no  mention  of  sheep  and  wool.  It  is 
quoted  below  essentially  in  the  form  in  which  it  was  ordered : 

BOND  AND  NOHL  CO. 

Dry  Goods,  Wedding  Outfits,  Hosiery,  Shoes,  Men's  Furnishings 

Agricultural  Implements  and  Wagons 

Buggies. 

Also  a  Full  Line  of  the  Best  Groceries  and  Flour 

Our  Specialties 

Bain  Wagons,  McCormick  &  Deering  Mowers  and  Rakes 
Lion  Special  Hats,  Red  Goose  School  Shoes 

Espanola,  N.  M. 

With  the  usual  note  of  caution,  an  inquiry  was  also  dis- 
patched to  R.  G.  Dun  and  Company  for  information  about 
the  Hinkle-Leadstone  Company  in  order  to  be  sure  the  pre- 
mium plan  was  legitimate.  Whether  or  not  the  premium  plan 
was  ever  put  into  effect  and  if  so,  with  what  effect,  is  not 
disclosed. 

The  Bond  &  Nohl  store  was  not  only  an  important  sub- 
sistence center  but  also  a  clearing  house  for  diverse,  unre- 
lated community  functions.  The  Espanola  post  office  was 
located  at  the  store,  and  Frank  Bond  was  the  postmaster.94 
This  fact  alone  would  have  made  the  Bond  &  Nohl  premises 
a  focus  of  community  interest,  but  it  is  doubtful  that  Frank 
or  George  Bond  permitted  a  great  deal  of  social  intercourse 
of  the  proverbial  cracker-barrel  variety  in  the  store.  HOW- 
OS.  Letter  Book  No.  55.  September  29,  1914,  p.  323  ;  Letter  Book  No.  58,  May  28, 
1915,  p.  811. 

94.  Frank  Bond  was  appointed  postmaster  at  Espanola  on  August  18,  1887.  Cer- 
tificate of  appointment,   September  28,  1887,  Bond  Papers,  lot.  eit. 


302  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ever,  a  number  of  personal  and  civic  functions  were  certainly 
performed  for  their  customers  and  for  the  community. 
George  Bond,  Frank  Bond,  and  A.  MacArthur  all  spoke  fluent 
French  as  well  as  Spanish,  and  they  tried  to  find  stenogra- 
phers who  understood  both  English  and  Spanish.95  As  a  result 
they  were  called  upon  to  act  as  interpreters  and  to  write  let- 
ters in  English  for  those  who  spoke  only  Spanish.96  For  those 
who  didn't  know  how  to  handle  claims  with  insurance  com- 
panies they  drew  drafts  through  their  own  accounts;  they 
recruited  sheepherders,  made  claims  for  pensions,  helped 
renters  apply  for  grazing  permits,  and  even  found  a  house 
for  a  Taos  professor  to  rent  in  Espanola.97  There  being  no 
newspaper  in  Espanola,  public  notices  were  posted  at  the 
store,  and  on  at  least  one  occasion  when  a  sheep  feeder  in 
Colorado  needed  some  men  for  a  month's  employment,  Bond 
recruited  them  through  such  notices,  arranged  for  their  trans- 
portation, collected  the  fare  from  the  feeder,  and  charged 
nothing  for  the  service.98  Another  time  he  even  arranged  to 
advance  twenty-five  dollars  a  month  to  a  Wyoming  man's 
estranged  wife  who  lived  in  Espanola.99 

In  June,  1914,  two  thugs  attacked  Earl  Cochran,  a  night 
watchman  at  the  store,  beat  him  over  the  head  with  a  six- 
shooter,  and  left  him  for  dead.  They  were  caught  near  Dixon, 
New  Mexico,  and  returned  to  the  state  penitentiary  at  Santa 
Fe.  Bond  retained  the  Santa  Fe  law  firm  of  Renehan  and 
Wright  to  prosecute  the  outlaws ;  and  although  he  felt  it  was 
important  to  see  that  justice  was  done,  Bond's  inherent  aver- 
sion to  legal  unpleasantness  prompted  him  to  arrange  for  his 
deposition  to  be  submitted  to  the  court  rather  than  answer  a 
subpoena  to  testify  in  person.100  At  about  the  same  time 
Bond  made  a  complaint  about  a  gambling  table  that  was 

96.  Interview  with  Stuart  MacArthur,  loe.  eft.;  Letter  Book  No.  57,  March  81,  1916, 
p.  492.  No  doubt  other  managers  also  spoke  Spanish. 

96.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  July  20,  1915,  p.  183. 

97.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  April  12,  1915,  p.  694  ;  Letter  Book  No.  58,  May  11,  1915, 
P.  118 ;  ibid..  May  19,  1915,  p.   181 ;  ibid.,  June  2,  1916,  p.  876 ;  Letter  Book  No.  59, 
August  8,  1915,  p.  312. 

»8.  Letter  Book  No.  58.  April  30,  1915,  p.  11 ;  ibid.,  May  6,  1915,  p.  61 ;  ibid..  May  20, 
1915,  p.  205. 

99.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  August  23,  1915,  p.  464. 

100.  Letter  Book  No.  5S,  June  22,  1914,  p.  97;  ibid.,  June  24,  1914,  p.  Ill;  ibid., 
July  1, 1914,  p.  208  ;  Letter  Book  No.  58,  June  2.  1916,  p.  863. 


FRANK  BOND  303 

being  operated  in  a  local  saloon,  taking  care  not  to  become 
implicated  himself.101 

Bond  &  Nohl's  activities,  then,  covered  the  broad  front  of 
merchandising,  commodity  speculation,  hides,  pelts,  wool, 
sheep,  feeder  lambs,  feed  lot  operation,  and  community  serv- 
ice. Frank  Bond's  propinquity,  of  course,  permitted  him  to 
influence  the  company's  activities  in  many  ways  and  also  to 
utilize  it  for  the  administration  of  his  projects  or  for  a  me- 
dium of  financial  support.  When  this  was  done,  however,  it 
redounded  to  Frank  Bond's  financial  detriment  because  any 
profits  realized  from  activities  carried  by  Bond  &  Nohl  were 
shared  with  the  other  stockholders  whereas  those  which  were 
on  his  personal  books  were  not.  There  is  no  evidence  whatso- 
ever that  he  at  any  time  tried  to  avoid  this  consequence. 

In  many  ways  Bond  &  Nohl  was  a  continuation  of  the 
original  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  partnership,  Louis  Nohl  assuming 
much  of  the  routine  management  responsibility  and  thus 
freeing  Bond  to  devote  more  of  his  time  to  sheep  renting  as 
well  as  to  the  financial  and  organizational  problems  asso- 
ciated with  his  expanding  sphere  of  interest  which,  in  addi- 
tion to  sheep  and  wool,  had  begun  to  include  investments, 
land  management,  and  even  lumbering. 

7.  An  Adventure  in  Lumbering 

Born  in  1864,  C.  L.  Pollard  came  to  Antonito,  Colorado, 
in  1887  at  the  age  of  twenty-three  as  a  telegraph  operator 
for  the  Denver  and  Rio  Grande  Railroad,  later  moving  suc- 
cessively to  Del  Norte,  Cumbres,  Embudo,  and  Chama.  In 
1902  he  settled  in  Espanola,  New  Mexico,  and  with  two  other 
partners  founded  the  firm  of  Biggs,  Pollard,  and  Graves.1 
The  partnership  was  short-lived,  and  the  following  year, 
1903,  the  firm  became  the  C.  L.  Pollard  Company,  general 
store  and  dealers  in  lumber,  building  material,  and  fruit 
boxes.2 

The  exact  date  that  Frank  Bond  became  associated  with 
Pollard  cannot  be  established,  but  it  undoubtedly  occurred  in 

101.  Letter  Book  No.  57.  February  25,  1915,  p.  212. 

1.  Interview  with  Rowland  C.  Pollard,  Albuquerque,  1956. 

2.  Interview  with  W.  P.  Cook,  Espanola,  June  1,  1967. 


304  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

January  or  February  of  1903,  coincidental  with  the  dropping 
out  of  Biggs  and  Graves.  In  addition  to  dealing  in  merchan- 
dise and  lumber,  Pollard  was  active  in  the  wool  business,  and 
it  was  through  these  wool  dealings  that  the  Bond-Pollard 
association  began — a  stormy  relationship  that  eventually  took 
Frank  Bond  into  lumbering  operations  and  court  litigation 
that  lasted  until  July  27,  1925.3  Bond  described  Pollard  as  "a 
very  peculiar  man,  rather  an  unknown  quantity,  not  well 
balanced,  extremely  bull-headed.  He  would  prefer  to  have  his 
own  way  and  lose  money  rather  than  let  the  other  fellow  have 
his  way,  and  by  so  doing  make  some  money." 4 

Frank  Bond  joined  Pollard  under  unusual  circumstances. 
He  usually  went  into  business  with  men  who  had  earned  his 
respect  through  a  demonstration  of  the  way  in  which  they 
could  handle  business ;  in  this  case  the  opposite  circumstance 
prevailed.  Pollard  had  been  actually  doing  his  wool  business 
at  a  loss,  and  being  an  aggressive  individual  willing  to  operate 
without  a  profit,  he  was  able  to  force  the  Bonds  into  sacri- 
ficing their  profits.5  Bond  probably  recognized  a  worthy  op- 
ponent when  he  saw  one  and  reasoned  that  it  would  be  better 
to  have  him  on  the  same  side  of  the  fence.  However,  the  entire 
relationship  with  Pollard  was  maintained  with  the  highest 
degree  of  secrecy.  Bond's  interest  was  not  disclosed  to  Dun  or 
Bradstreet,  care  was  taken  that  other  wool  men  did  not  know 
that  Bond  was  working  with  Pollard,6  and  when  it  became 
necessary  to  have  a  new  stock  certificate  book  printed  he  even 
went  so  far  as  to  have  the  printing  handled  through  the  First 
National  Bank  in  Santa  Fe  so  that  the  Bond  connection  might 
not  be  revealed.7 

The  capital  stock  of  the  company  was  $38,000,  but  only 
32,000  shares  were  issued,  and  there  is  evidence  to  indicate 
that  the  original  holdings  were  4,000  shares  for  C.  L.  Pollard 
and  28,000  shares  for  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.,  Espanola.  It  also 
appears  that  Pollard's  interest  was  obtained  by  giving  a  note 

8.  Capital  Stock  Tax  Reports,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 
4.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  May  5,  1905. 
6.  Ibid. 

6.  "This  is  confidential,  as  if  our  wool  men  knew  that  we  were  buying  Pollard's 
wool,  it  would  hurt  us  both  with  the  trade."  Ibid.,  June  7,  1908. 

7.  Ibid..  February  20,  1909. 


FRANK  BOND  305 

for  $5,000  to  the  First  National  Bank  in  Santa  Fe  which  was 
endorsed  by  Bond.8 

The  year  1903  was  a  busy  one,  events  affecting  and  af- 
fected by  Pollard  occurring  rapidly.  On  February  7,  1903, 
Frank  Bond  and  his  wife,  May  Anna,  bought  the  Santo  Tomas 
Apostol  del  Rio  de  las  Trampas  Grant.  This  property,  com- 
monly referred  to  as  the  Trampas  Grant,  had  been  granted 
by  Spain  to  Juan  D.  Arguello  and  confirmed  by  Congress  on 
June  21,  I860.9  The  grant  comprised  27,481  acres  as  officially 
surveyed  by  the  Surveyor  General  of  the  United  States,10 
and  was  patented  January  26, 1903.  The  grant  included  about 
seven  small  villages  and  it  was  partly  in  Taos  County  and 
partly  in  Rio  Arriba  County,  located  about  twelve  miles  east 
of  the  Denver  and  Rio  Grande  Railroad  siding  at  Lajoya, 
southeast  of  Embudo  Station,  and  north  of  Santa  Fe.11  Con- 
tiguous grant  lands  were  the  Santa  Barbara  on  the  east  and 
the  Las  Truchas  on  the  south.12 

The  actual  investment  by  Frank  Bond  in  this  property 
was  $17,857.83,  and  later  additions  to  the  investment  resulted 
in  accumulated  costs  as  shown  in  Table  46. 

TABLE  46 
TRAMPAS  GRANT  INVESTMENT 

Year  Amount 

1903  $17,857.83 

1904  24,803.06 

1905  24,098.88 

1906  24,207.66 

1907  14,811.14 

1912  106.99« 

1913  20,000.00 

a  Expense 

The  ink  was  hardly  dry  on  his  purchase  when  Bond  was 
offered  a  profit  of  $10,000  if  he  would  sell  the  grant.  He  re- 
fused, but  commented :  "I  never  had  anything  I  wouldn't  sell, 

8.  Ibid.,  February  27,  1903. 

9.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

10.  Charles  F.  Coan,  however,  reports  the  acreage  of  this  grant  as  29,030  acres — 
14,965  acres  in  Rio  Arriba  County  and  14,065  in  Taos  County.  Coan,  op.  cit.,  pp.  474-475. 

11.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

12.  U.  S.,  Department  of  the  Interior,  G.L.O.,  Map  of  Territory  of  New  Mexico, 
1903. 


306  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

so  they  may  induce  me  to  part  with  it."13  There  is  little  doubt 
but  that  he  lived  to  regret  keeping  the  grant. 

During  this  same  month  of  what  must  have  been  a  frantic 
February,  Bond  also  expressed  an  interest  in  buying  the 
Santa  Barbara  Grant  which  lay  just  to  the  east  of  the  Tram- 
pas.  Nothing  ever  came  of  this  thought,  but  two  months  later 
he  was  still  thinking  about  it.14 

In  March,  Frank  Bond  put  the  Trampas  Grant  on  the 
market,  however.  While  he  opined  that  it  was  worth  more 
than  $1.50  per  acre,  he  felt  that  the  best  trade  could  be  made 
by  selling  it  to  the  United  States  for  scrip,  which  was  selling 
for  $5.50  in  Colorado.15  He  approached  the  U.  S.  Land  Com- 
missioner in  Santa  Fe  and  also  wrote  to  the  Land  Office  in 
Washington  on  the  matter,  but  nothing  developed.16 

Before  the  spring  was  out,  there  had  been  formed  a  new 
and  short-lived  firm  which  was  organized  for  a  lumbering 
operation  and  called  the  Bond  and  Jones  Company.  Whether 
the  Bond  and  Jones  Company  ever  shipped  any  lumber  is 
doubtful,  and  by  August  Bond  was  sorry  he  had  tried  it.17  It 
was  never  heard  from  again. 

During  this  time  the  C.  L.  Pollard  Company  invested 
$5,000  in  the  Truchas  Lumber  Company  which  operated  a 
lumber  mill  about  5  miles  north  of  Truchas,18  and  the  com- 
pany began  to  show  signs  of  being  in  trouble.  There  was  a 
merchandise  investment  of  less  than  $15,000  and  $10,000  of 
it  had  not  been  paid  for,  with  $3,300  of  the  debt  being  to 
G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.,  Espanola.  There  was  a  bank  overdraft  of 
$218.67,  and  in  addition  to  the  $5,000  capital  investment  in 
the  Truchas  Lumber  Company  there  were  receivables  on  the 
Pollard  books  from  Truchas  amounting  to  almost  $14,000. 
Bond  promptly  arranged  with  R.  J.  Palen  for  the  Santa  Fe 

13.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  February  20,  1903. 

14.  Ibid.,  February  23,  1903  ;  ibid.,  April  17,  1903. 

15.  Ibid.,  March  25,  1903. 

16.  Ibid.,  March  5,  1903  ;  ibid.,  April  17,  1903. 

17.  Ibid.,  June  8,  1903  ;  ibid.,  n.d.,  p.  51. 

18.  Interview  with  R.  C.  Pollard. 

The  town  of  Truchas  was  about  sixteen  miles  east  of  Espanola  on  the  Sendra  del 
Rosario  Grant.  The  mill  itself,  however,  seems  to  have  actually  been  on  the  Las  Truchas 
Grant  just  to  the  north.  U.S.,  Department  of  the  Interior,  G.L.O.,  Map  of  Territory  of 
New  Mexico,  1903. 


FRANK  BOND  307 

bank  to  advance  Pollard  $5,000  in  order  to  pay  some  of  the 
accounts  payable,19  suggesting  that  the  other  creditors  be 
paid  first  and  then  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  when  they  were  in 
better  shape.  Bond  advised  that  they  try  to  operate  on  as 
nearly  a  cash  basis  as  possible,  discounting  every  invoice, 
and  asked  Pollard  to  stay  up  at  the  mill.  He  pointed  out  that 
the  Truchas  Lumber  Company  receivables  had  to  be  reduced 
or  he  would  be  forced  to  move  in  and  take  it  over  himself, 
even  at  the  risk  of  exposing  their  interest  to  public  view.20 
Shortly  thereafter,  Brady,  who  with  B.  F.  Bookhamer  was  a 
partner  in  the  mill,  decided  to  sell  his  interest  in  the  Truchas 
Lumber  Company  for  $3,500,  and  Pollard  bought  it  by  pre- 
vailing on  Frank  Bond  to  endorse  his  personal  note  for  $2,000 
in  order  to  do  it.21 

Financial  priming  of  the  lumber  business  now  began  in 
earnest.  In  December  the  $5,000  Pollard  note  became  due  and 
could  not  be  paid ;  in  addition  the  Truchas  Lumber  Company 
needed  $5,000,  so  Bond  underwrote  the  necessary  $10,000 
with  the  bank  in  Santa  Fe.22  In  February,  1904,  Pollard  had 
again  overdrawn  his  account,  and  Bond  asked  the  bank  to 
keep  him  advised  of  Pollard's  activities,  at  the  same  time  ar- 
ranging for  the  overdraft  to  be  covered  with  a  note.  Less 
than  two  weeks  later,  Bond  again  had  to  get  the  Truchas  com- 
pany out  of  trouble  by  guaranteeing  a  $14,000  advance  by  the 
bank.  In  early  March  $2,500  more  went  the  same  way  and  in 
addition  Bond  had  to  endorse  a  $1,000  note  of  the  Truchas 
Lumber  Company  held  by  B.  F.  Bookhamer,  the  other  re- 
maining investor  in  the  company  after  Brady  left.  In  less 
than  a  week  Pollard  had  again  overdrawn  his  accounts,  and 
Bond  had  to  endorse  a  $6,500  note  for  the  Truchas  Lumber 
Company  and  a  $2,500  note  for  the  C.  L.  Pollard  Company  to 
cover  the  overdrafts.  This  drew  unmistakable  fire  from  Bond, 
but  a  week  later  he  had  to  give  the  bank  $6,700  more  so  that 
Pollard  could  pay  his  bills.23 

19.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  October  5,  1903. 

20.  Ibid.,  n.d.,  p.  61 ;  ibid.,  October  19,  1903. 

21.  Ibid.,  November  3,  1903  ;  ibid.,  November  4,  1903. 

22.  Ibid.,  December  9,  1903. 

23.  Ibid.,  February  2,   1904;  ibid.,  February  13,  1904;  ibid.,  March  8,  1904;  ibid., 
March  9,  1904  ;  ibid.,  March  12,  1904  ;  ibid.,  March  15,  1904. 


308  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

In  June  $10,000  in  notes  of  the  Pollard  Company  and  the 
Truchas  Company  came  due,  couldn't  be  paid,  and  Bond  was 
forced  to  get  them  extended ;  in  August  he  had  to  extend  notes 
in  the  amount  of  $23,000  which  Pollard  couldn't  meet.24 

By  this  time  the  Bond  investment  in  the  Truchas  Lumber 
Company  had  climbed  to  $60,000,  and  Frank  Bond  was  more 
than  just  a  little  annoyed,  for  Pollard  had  gone  in  with  two 
men  named  Brooks  and  Thompson  in  a  venture  to  make  rail- 
road ties — probably  without  Bond's  concurrence  for  he  did 
not  approve  of  Thompson  at  all.25 

With  tongue  in  cheek,  Bond  requested  Pollard  to  make  up 
a  statement  and  to  make  it  appear  as  bad  as  possible  so  that 
it  wouldn't  be  as  bad  as  it  looked,26  and  then  in  an  effort  to 
prevent  further  losses  due  to  the  loose  credit  policy,  Bond  had 
Pollard  send  a  letter  to  each  of  his  customers  asking  them  to 
pay  their  accounts. 

Despite  the  difficulty  involved  in  keeping  the  Pollard  and 
Truchas  businesses  on  a  sound  financial  footing,  the  profit 
showing  for  1904  was  fairly  satisfactory,27  and  in  May  of  the 
following  year  an  agreement  was  signed  which  provided  that 
so  long  as  the  Bonds  controlled  the  C.  L.  Pollard  Company 
and  so  long  as  C.  L.  Pollard  was  general  manager  and  con- 
tinued to  hold  4,000  shares  of  stock,  these  4,000  shares  would 
be  entitled  to  receive  one-third  of  the  net  profits  although 
they  only  represented  one-eighth  of  the  outstanding  shares.28 
Although  profit-sharing  was  a  common  practice  in  the  Bond 
system,  this  was  a  peculiar  arrangement.  The  impatient  tenor 
of  Frank  Bond's  correspondence  with  Pollard  bearing  over- 
tones of  discord,  only  serves  to  deepen  the  mystery  of  this 
generous  contract. 

In  view  of  a  new  law  requiring  that  the  names  of  the  offi- 
cers and  directors  be  filed  with  the  Secretary  of  State  after 
each  annual  meeting,  and  on  account  of  their  desire  to  main- 
tain the  esoteric  nature  of  their  association  with  Pollard,  a 

24.  Ibid.,  June  8,  1904 ;  ibid.,  August  15,  1904 ;  ibid..  August  16,  1904 ;  ibid.,  August 
17,  1904. 

25.  Ibid.,  August  15,  1904  ;  ibid.,  August  16,  1904. 

26.  Ibid.,  August  15,  1904. 

27.  However,  actual  figures  are  not  available. 

28.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  May  5,  1905. 


FRANK  BOND  309 

problem  arose  because  three  officers  were  necessary  and  two 
of  the  three  stockholders  were  Bonds.  Obviously  a  report 
under  these  circumstances  would  divulge  the  combination. 
So  perhaps  because  of  this  or  perhaps  through  the  normal 
progress  of  the  business,  F.  R.  Frankenburger,  who  had  been 
in  charge  of  the  lumber  mill  commissary,29  was  brought  into 
the  company  holding  2,000  shares  of  stock.  He  undoubtedly 
already  knew  of  the  Bond's  interest  in  the  business.  One  ad- 
ditional stockholder  was  necessary ;  and  since  R.  J.  Palen  of 
the  First  National  Bank  in  Santa  Fe  had  for  a  long  time  been 
a  confidant  of  Frank  Bond  and  knew  all  about  the  arrange- 
ment, he  was  issued  one  share  of  stock  and  made  vice-presi- 
dent. C.  L.  Pollard  was  president,  and  Frankenburger  was 
secretary-treasurer.30  In  this  way  the  Bond  stockholdings 
were  completely  concealed. 

The  absence  of  correspondence  with  the  Pollard  and 
Truchas  companies  from  May,  1905,  to  September,  1907,  is 
probably  more  indicative  of  records  having  been  lost  than  it 
is  of  the  sudden  cessation  of  problems.  That  credit  policies 
were  still  worrisome  is  indicated  by  Frank  Bond's  caution  to 
Pollard  at  that  time  to  beware  of  Miss  Clara  True  who  owed 
$1,500  to  Pollard  and  his  advice  to  secure  it  with  a  mortgage 
on  the  Daganett  Ranch.  However,  Bond  at  the  same  time 
indicated  that  the  mill  was  no  longer  operating  at  a  loss.31 

On  June  20,  1907,  the  Trampas  Grant  was  sold  to  the  Las 
Trampas  Lumber  Company,  a  corporation  organized  on  June 
11,  1907,  for  the  purpose  of  buying  the  grant.32  The  selling 
price  is  unknown,  as  are  the  original  stockholders  of  the 
company,  but  a  mill  was  set  up  at  Trampas,  New  Mexico,  for 
the  production  of  railroad  ties,  poles,  piling,  and  lumber.33 
Certain  covenants  of  reservation  in  the  title,  however,  led  to 
litigation  which  some  years  later  brought  the  Trampas  Grant 
back  to  the  Bond  bailiwick. 

With  the  Trampas  Grant  out  of  the  way,  the  C.  L.  Pollard 
Company  continued  its  lumber  and  merchandise  business 

29.  Interview  with  J.  E.  Davenport. 

30.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  May  5,  1905. 

31.  Ibid.,  September  17,  1907. 

32.  Tax  Return,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

33.  Records,  loc.  cit. 


310  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

unencumbered,  but  by  March  of  the  following  year,  1908, 
difficulties  with  C.  L.  Pollard  reached  their  peak,  resulting 
in  one  of  Frank  Bond's  explosions  which,  though  rare,  were 
usually  as  violent  as  they  were  justified.  Pollard  had  become 
indebted  to  the  company  fairly  heavily  on  his  drawing  ac- 
count. He  also  owned  the  Herrera  Building  which,  as  a  result 
of  a  conversation  with  Frank  Bond,  he  applied  on  his  note. 
Bond  had  suggested  that  he  might  do  this.  However,  Pollard 
must  have  sold  it  to  the  company  for  an  exorbitant  price 
for  Bond  accused  him  of  either  not  knowing  right  from  wrong 
or  of  intentionally  trying  to  take  an  undue  advantage.  He 
pointed  out  that  Pollard  had  bought  the  building  originally 
with  company  money  without  consulting  the  Bonds,  and  hav- 
ing done  this  in  a  period  of  deficit  had  therefore  effectively 
used  capital  funds  to  buy  it  for  himself.  In  suggesting  that 
Pollard  apply  the  building  on  his  account  or  on  his  note, 
nothing  was  said  about  the  price,  but  Frank  Bond  supposed 
that  "a  man  of  your  intelligence  and  fair-mindedness  would 
certainly  do  the  right  thing  which  was  to  turn  it  over  at  cost 
less  whatever  rent  has  been  collected  on  it."34  He  said  that 
they  certainly  did  not  want  the  building  but  did  want  the 
cash  back  that  Pollard  took  out  of  the  business  to  buy  it  with 
and  that  he  would  accept  the  building  on  no  other  terms. 
Otherwise,  Pollard  could  keep  the  building  and  pay  his  debts 
plus  interest  on  the  money.  "Furthermore,"  he  wrote,  "as 
you  are  having  to  play  at  high-handed  finance  we  must  ask 
you  to  at  once  protect  us  on  the  note  you  owe  us  for  $7,000. "35 
He  asked  Pollard  to  hypothecate  enough  of  his  insurance  poli- 
cies to  do  this  and  then  demanded  that  he  confine  his  living 
expenses  to  his  salary  and  discontinue  drawing  money  out, 
asserting  that  if  the  Bonds  did  that  the  company  would  be 
bankrupt.  Bond  directed  Pollard  to  discontinue  all  logging 
for  good  and  to  confine  himself  exclusively  to  the  mercantile 
business.  He  concluded  his  screed  by  saying:  "We  will  have 
no  friction  in  business,  things  must  run  smoothly,  and  our 
policy  must  be  the  one  which  will  govern  the  business  from 
now  on."36 

34.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  March  1,  1908. 

35.  Ibid. 
86.  Ibid. 


FRANK  BOND  311 

Proving  that  he  meant  business,  Frank  Bond  notified  R. 
J.  Palen  to  give  Pollard  no  more  credit,  and  shortly  after- 
wards he  refused  to  guarantee  a  $5,000  note.37  Amidst  this, 
Bond  in  writing  to  E.  H.  Leavenworth  in  Wood  River,  Ne- 
braska, said  that  the  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  Company  had  suf- 
fered a  severe  loss,  a  loss  too  big  to  advertise,  and  that  he  had 
had  a  severe  jolt  to  his  faith  in  human  nature,  adding  that 
although  he  thought  people  were  honest,  he  was  sometimes 
wrong.38 

Two  months  later  Bond  endorsed  a  $5,000  note  for  Pollard. 

In  January,  1909,  Frank  Bond  found  that  the  credit  poli- 
cies still  left  something  to  be  desired,  and  he  found  it  neces- 
sary to  make  an  independent  inquiry  into  a  matter  concerning 
a  customer  who  had  received  $1,200  worth  of  lumber  on 
credit.39  On  March  1,  without  Bond's  concurrence,  a  large 
shipment  of  lumber  was  sent  to  McPhee  and  McGinnity,  Den- 
ver lumber  dealers.  This  sale  was  made  on  credit,  the  account 
not  to  be  paid  until  July  1  at  which  time  they  could  either  take 
another  sixty  days  or  take  a  2  per  cent  discount.  This  ar- 
rangement prevented  the  payment  of  notes  due  to  the  Santa 
Fe  bank,  and  in  addition  Pollard  owed  the  Bonds  more  than 
$5,000.40 

Frank  Bond  was  now  finally  at  the  end  of  his  patience. 

Therefore,  on  March  1,  1909,  Pollard  received  $1,000  for 
his  share  in  the  business  and  forthwith  left  the  company.41 
Milo  Hill  was  brought  into  the  company  as  secretary  and 
treasurer,  and  Frankenburger  was  made  president  and  gen- 
eral manager.  In  addition,  Louis  F.  Nohl  was  given  $2,000 
worth  of  stock  so  he  could  work  with  Frankenburger.  It 
heretofore  had  not  been  possible  for  Nohl  to  have  anything 
to  do  with  the  company  because  Nohl  and  Pollard  were  so 
unfriendly  they  couldn't  even  talk  business  with  each  other.42 

Sometime  between  March  1, 1909,  and  the  end  of  1910  the 
C.  L.  Pollard  Company  was  re-christened.  It  was  from  then 

37.  Ibid.,  March  2,  1908  ;  ibid.,  March  21,  1908. 

38.  Ibid.,  March  2,  1908. 

39.  Ibid.,  January  13,  1909. 

40.  Ibid.,  March  25,  1909  ;  ibid.,  March  1,  1909 ;  ibid.,  January  13,  1909. 

41.  Ibid.,  March  24,  1909. 

42.  Ibid.,  January  15,  1909  ;  ibid.,  February  23,  1909. 


312  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

on  called  the  Espanola  Mercantile  Company,  but  any  connec- 
tion between  it  and  the  Bonds  or  Bond  &  Nohl  was  still  a 
guarded  secret.43  In  fact,  in  Frank  Bond's  accounts  it  was 
always  referred  to  as  "Investment  No.  5"  without  any  fur- 
ther identification.  Similarly,  the  statements  of  the  Espanola 
Mercantile  Company  which  were  submitted  to  Bond  were 
typed  on  blank  sheets  of  paper  with  any  identification  of  the 
company  being  carefully  omitted.  This  presumably  prevented 
all  the  office  help  and  others  who  might  see  the  statements 
from  knowing  that  a  connection  existed  between  Bond  &  Nohl 
and  the  Espanola  Mercantile  Company,  ostensibly  competi- 
tors.44 However,  whenever  Bond  &  Nohl  received  an  order 
they  couldn't  fill,  it  was  turned  over  to  the  Espanola  Mercan- 
tile Company,  so  there  must  have  been  some  communication 
between  the  two  stores.45 

The  company,  with  Pollard  out,  engaged  in  no  further 
lumbering  work,  and  at  the  end  of  1915  it  was  still  operating 
under  the  control  of  Frank  Bond.  The  ultimate  disposition  of 
its  investment  in  the  Truchas  Lumber  Company  is  unknown, 
but  the  accounts  at  the  end  of  October  1912,  give  no  indica- 
tion of  such  an  investment  so  the  interest  in  this  company 
was  probably  disposed  of  during  the  reorganization.  Bond 
was  undoubtedly  weary  of  lumber  and  probably  let  it  go 
without  any  sense  of  loss  whatsoever. 

Sales  of  the  C.  L.  Pollard  Company  and  the  Espanola  Mer- 
cantile Company  distinctly  reflect  the  change  in  organization. 
From  Table  47  it  can  be  seen  that  the  credit  policy  was  imme- 
diately tightened  so  that  credit  sales  dropped  sharply  after 
1909  and  thenceforth  always  remained  less  than  the  cash 
sales  for  the  same  period. 

The  Espanola  Mercantile  Company  occupied  a  one-story, 
metal-roofed,  iron-clad  frame  and  adobe  building  in  Espanola, 
probably  of  very  ordinary  aspect.  This  was  not,  however,  the 
only  business  property  owned  by  the  firm.  The  company  also 
owned  a  one-story  adobe  building  measuring  thirty-two  feet 

43.  Ibid.,  September  6,  1910. 

44.  The  statements   are  completely  unidentified,   but  proof  that  they  are  actually 
Espanola  Mercantile  Co.   statements   has   been   established   by   tracing   certain   account 
balances  to  identifiable  amounts  from  other  sources. 

45.  Letter  Book  No.  50,  October  20,  1913,  p.  184. 


FRANK  BOND  313 

TABLE  47 

ESPANOLA  MERCANTILE  (C.  L.  POLLARD)  COMPANY  SALES 
(dollars  in  thousands) 

Year  Cash  Sales  Credit  Sales  Total 

1904  $29.6         $34.3         $63.9 

1905  40.2  55.4  95.6 

1906  35.9  49.9  85.8 

1907  36.5  49.1  85.6 

1908  30.1  33.1  63.2 

1909  33.3  30.1  63.4 

1910  36.7  21.1  57.8 

1911  33.6  28.4  62.0 

1912  31.8  31.4  63.2 

1913  34.5  24.6  59.1 

1914  33.1  27.6  60.7 

1915  37.0  23.3  60.3 

wide  and  eighty-two  feet  long,  located  about  100  feet  west  of 
the  railroad  tracks.  This  building  was,  curiously  enough,  oc- 
cupied by  a  saloon — probably  the  last  thing  the  Espanola 
citizenry  would  have  connected  with  Frank  Bond.46 

At  the  end  of  1912  the  profit  and  loss  account  balance  was 
$14,146  and  by  the  end  of  1915  it  stood  at  $23,566,  repre- 
senting an  average  yearly  profit  of  about  $3,140  per  year,  and 
there  may  have  been  some  distributions  of  profit  during  that 
time.47 

Frank  Bond  probably  drew  a  sigh  of  relief  and  imagined 
that  he  was  out  of  the  logging  and  timber  business.  His  first 
love  was  sheep,  wool,  and  merchandise ;  certainly  he  would 
never  have  done  more  than  have  a  few  logs  chopped  for  his 
fireplace.  But  it  was  not  to  be.  The  interregnum  lasted  only 
four  years,  and  then  Frank  Bond  found  himself  back  at  the 
head  of  a  sizable  timber  project  that  lasted  for  twelve  more 
years. 

When  the  Trampas  Grant  was  sold  to  the  Las  Trampas 
Lumber  Company  in  1907,  Bond  had  reserved  2,000  acres  in 
addition  to  650  acres  that  were  already  allotted  to  certain 
settlements  on  the  grant.48  A  decision  of  the  Supreme  Court 

46.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  January  4,  1915,  p.  433. 

47.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

48.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  June  26,  1912. 


314  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

raised  questions  concerning  the  title  which  Bond  had  passed 
to  the  Las  Trampas  Lumber  Company,  and  a  number  of  the 
settlers  on  the  grant  filed  claims  for  parts  of  the  grant  in 
excess  of  the  650  acres  allotted  to  them.  In  turn,  the  Las 
Trampas  Lumber  Company  instituted  a  suit  against  the  for- 
mer owner,  Frank  Bond.  Bond,  of  course,  had  a  pronounced 
distaste  for  any  kind  of  litigation,40  and  on  May  1,  1913,  an 
agreement  was  reached  with  the  Las  Trampas  Lumber  Com- 
pany.50 By  the  terms  of  this  agreement,  Bond  was  to  buy  750 
shares,  or  one-half  of  the  issued  capital  stock  of  the  Las 
Trampas  Lumber  Company  for  $57,648.75,  representing  a 
par  value  of  $75,000.00.  Bond  was  further  bound  to  try  and 
sell  the  Trampas  Grant  and  the  timber ;  in  its  turn  the  com- 
pany was  to  release  Bond  from  the  covenants  of  seizure, 
warranty,  quiet  and  peaceable  possession,  and  all  other  cove- 
nants in  the  warranty  deed,  and  also  to  dismiss  the  suit 
against  him.51  This  was  accomplished,  and  Frank  Bond  found 
himself  again  in  the  timber  business  as  president  of  the  Las 
Trampas  Lumber  Company,  Albuquerque. 

Bond  promptly  went  to  work  in  an  effort  to  dispose  of  the 
grant  and  made  available  to  prospective  purchasers  the  re- 
sults of  lumber  surveys  which  had  been  made  on  the  property. 
The  Las  Trampas  Lumber  Company  had  employed  a  timber 
estimator  and  cruiser  named  W.  A.  Ross  to  survey  the  tract, 
and  again  in  1912,  before  the  litigation  began,  they  had  em- 
ployed the  firm  of  Brayton  and  Lawbaugh  of  Chicago,  Illi- 
nois, to  make  a  cruise  and  estimate  the  tract  and  show  the 
amount  of  timber  on  each  forty-acres  subdivision  of  the 
property.  The  work  was  done,  and  exhaustive  and  detailed 
maps  were  prepared  covering  the  whole  property  and  the 
timber  on  each  forty  acres.  The  maps  and  plats  in  addition 
to  showing  the  amount  of  timber  also  showed  the  character 
of  the  logging  ground,  the  contour  of  the  land,  the  canyons, 
streams,  and  elevations  at  different  points.  The  work  was 

49.  Bond  wrote:  "I  don't  like  law-suits,  much  prefer  a  settlement."  Ibid. 

60.  The  stockholders  of  the  company  were  James  B.  Herndon,  president,  O.  N. 
Marron,  C.  L.  Hill,  J.  J.  Hill,  G.  L.  Hill,  Ike  Graham,  and  Warren  Graham.  Agreement 
dated  May  1,  1913.  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

51.  Ibid. 


FRANK  BOND  315 

exhaustively  and  thoroughly  done.  Accompanying  the  plats 
and  maps  was  a  report  of  their  conclusions. 

The  sale  price  of  the  grant  set  by  Frank  Bond  was 
$160,000,  to  be  paid  $60,000  in  cash  and  the  balance  in  three 
equal  annual  payments  with  interest  at  6  per  cent.  The 
party  making  the  sale  would  receive  5  per  cent,  or  $8,000 
commission.52 

The  law  firm  of  Marron  and  Wood,  Albuquerque,  and  E. 
R.  Wright,  Santa  Fe,  represented  the  lumber  company  in  the 
proceedings  to  quiet  the  title  to  the  grant,  and  the  people  who 
lived  in  the  several  towns  and  villages  on  the  grant  were 
represented  by  A.  B.  Renehan  and  by  Charles  C.  Catron.  The 
gist  of  the  matter  was  that  although  650  acres  had  been  set 
aside  as  excluded  from  the  grant,  the  residents  of  Ojo  Sacro, 
Canada  de  los  Alamos,  Diamante,  Trampas,  Valle,  Llano 
Chamisal  (sometimes  called  Ojito) ,  and  the  possessions  along 
the  Santa  Barbara  River  raised  questions  of  claim  to  addi- 
tional portions  of  the  grant  on  which  these  villages  lay.  An 
agreement  was  reached  whereby  there  would  be  segregated 
from  the  grant  a  tract  around  each  town  and  settlement  large 
enough  to  include  all  of  the  lands  actually  occupied.  In  turn, 
the  residents  agreed  to  sign  quitclaim  deeds.53 

An  additional  agreement  was  reached  with  these  residents 
that  they  would  have  the  right  to  graze  their  domestic  ani- 
mals on  the  grant  outside  of  the  segregations,  could  take 
down  timber  for  fuel  and  could  take  unmerchantable  standing 
timber  for  fence  posts  and  vigas.  The  Trampas  Lumber  Com- 
pany was  also  bound  to  yield  right  of  way  for  existing  irriga- 
tion ditches  and  to  protect  the  ditches  in  the  course  of  their 
operations.54 

The  lumber  company  agreed  to  pay  C.  C.  Catron  $5,500 
to  secure  quitclaim  deeds  from  the  inhabitants  of  the  grant 
covering  the  grant  property  lying  outside  the  segregated 
areas  in  accordance  with  the  previous  stipulation.55  Frank 

52.  Letter  Book  No.  50,  November  21,  1918,  p.  336. 

53.  Las  Trampas  Lumber  Co.  v.  Juan  B.  Ortega,  et  al.,  Stipulation,  Bond  Papers, 
loc.  cit. 

54.  Unrecorded  agreement  between  Las  Trampas  Lumber  Company  and  Squatters, 
June  5,  1913.  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

55.  Agreement  between  Las  Trampas  Lumber  Co.  and  C.  C.  Catron,  June  2,  1913. 
Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 


316  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Bond  was  somewhat  impatient  to  have  the  entire  matter 
finally  settled,56  but  the  case  was  not  a  simple  one.  There  were 
288  defendants  named  in  the  action  plus  many  unknown  heirs 
of  deceased  claimants. 

The  final  decree  was  entered  on  April  16,  1914,  in  which 
the  Las  Trampas  Lumber  Company  was  adjudged  owner  in 
fee  simple  of  the  Trampas  Grant  except  for  the  village  reser- 
vations,57 thus  leaving  Frank  Bond  about  where  he  started  in 
1903. 

Bond's  first  prospect  was  T.  A.  Schomburg,  then  with  the 
Continental  Tie  and  Lumber  Company  in  Denver,  who  offered 
$1.50  per  1,000  feet  for  stumpage  on  the  grant.  Although 
Frank  Bond  had  only  been  over  the  grant  one  time,  he  didn't 
believe  there  was  as  much  timber  on  it  as  the  Chicago  sur- 
veyors estimated,  and  he  much  preferred  to  sell  the  grant 
outright.58  However,  he  went  to  Denver  and  discussed  the 
matter  with  Schomburg  who  then  appointed  F.  R.  Franken- 
burger  as  his  representative  to  go  over  the  grant  with  W.  A. 
Ross  who  had  made  the  original  timber  survey.59 

The  next  nibble  by  a  prospective  purchaser  came  from  a 
man  named  Blount  in  Walsenburg,  Colorado,  in  August,  1914. 
Like  the  Schomburg  inquiry,  nothing  ever  materialized.60  In 
October  another  prospect  appeared,  but  was  quoted  a  price  of 
$175,000  by  someone  in  Albuquerque  and  evidenced  no  fur- 
ther interest.  Frank  Bond  was  not  at  all  pleased  that  someone 
had  quoted  a  price  $15,000  higher  than  had  been  quoted  to 
other  people,  and  he  expressed  his  displeasure  bluntly.61 

Several  minor  problems  arose  near  the  end  of  1914.  The 
law  firm  of  Renehan  and  Wright  which  had  been  active  in  the 
title  litigation  submitted  their  statement  to  the  Trampas 
Lumber  Company  and  a  disagreement  over  it  arose  between 
Renehan  and  the  Las  Trampas  Lumber  Company  stock- 
holders. Bond  felt  it  was  absolutely  essential  that  pleasant 

66.  Letter  Book  No.  50,  November  10,  1913,  p.  253. 

57.  Las  Trampas  Lumber  Co.  v.  Juan  B.  Ortega,  et  al.,  No.  840.  Bond  Papers,  Joe.  ctt. 

58.  Letter  Book  No.  51,  February  23,  1914,  p.  256  ;  ibid.,  p.  263. 

59.  Ibid.,  April  1,  1914,  p.  583  ;  Letter  Book  No.  55,  October  12,  1914,  p.  444 ;  ibid., 
p.  445  ;  ibid,,  October  14,  1914,  p.  485. 

60.  Letter  Book  No.  5S,  August  11,  1914,  p.  594. 

61.  Letter  Book  No.  55,  October  14,  1914,  p.  485. 


FRANK  BOND  317 

relations  be  maintained,  and  since  he  owned  a  one-half  in- 
terest in  the  company  he  paid  half  the  bill  without  question 
and  secured  a  release  for  his  interest.  The  other  stockholders 
were  not  informed  of  Bond's  action,  and  he  left  them  to  fight 
it  out  among  themselves.62  Other  minor  annoyances  included 
an  over-valuation  on  the  Rio  Arriba  tax  assessment  and  the 
imminent  necessity  of  appealing  it  to  the  Board  of  Equaliza- 
tion. Bond  pointed  out  that  the  property  was  overvalued  in 
view  of  the  fact  that  they  couldn't  even  get  an  offer  for  it. 

The  next  prospective  buyer  appeared  in  the  form  of  a  Mr. 
Hartley  in  Kansas  City  in  March,  1915. 63  Another  inquiry 
came  in  August  from  Walter  G.  Turley  in  Santa  Fe  who  had 
a  colonization  project  in  mind.  Bond  didn't  think  the  property 
was  suitable  for  colonization,  and  nothing  ever  developed 
from  either  of  these  two  inquiries.64  Before  the  year  was  out 
Bond  was  willing  to  lower  the  asking  price  from  $160,000  to 
$135, OOO,65  but  the  property  was  simply  not  attracting  any 
buyers. 

Lumbering  was  no  more  successful  at  Trampas  than  it 
had  been  at  Truchas,  and  by  1919  the  sawmill  operation  was 
a  failure,  the  blacksmith  shop,  mill,  and  roads  were  all  aban- 
doned, a  deficit  of  over  $25,000  had  accumulated,  and  the 
stockholders  would  have  been  happy  to  sell  the  whole  grant 
for$60,000.66 

8.  Forbes  Wool  Company 

The  exact  background  and  organizational  beginnings  of 
the  Forbes  Wool  Company  are  not  only  obscured  by  the 
mists  of  time  but  also  shrouded  in  a  cloak  of  secrecy  that 
surrounded  its  ownership.  As  with  several  other  enterprises, 
clear  black  and  white  evidence  concerning  many  points  is  not 
available,  but  a  great  deal  can  be  deduced  from  the  records 
remaining. 

The  Forbes  Wool  Company  was  located  in  Trinidad, 
Colorado,  and  for  many  years  was  engaged  in  buying  wool 

62.  Letter  Book  No.  53,  July  21,  1914,  p.  426. 

63.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  March  25,  1915,  p.  460. 

64.  Letter  Book  No.  59,  August  2,  1915,  p.  302. 

65.  Ibid.,  July  28,  1915,  p.  248. 

66.  Capital  Stock  Tax  Reports,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 


318  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

from  the  western  growers,  scouring  it,  and  selling  it  in  the 
eastern  markets.1  The  Bond  records  leave  no  trace  of  the 
motivation  for  their  acquisition  of  an  interest  in  this  scouring 
mill,  but  Fred  Warshauer  was  handling  large  quantities  of 
wool  in  Antonito,2  and  he  was  undoubtedly  instrumental  in 
bringing  George  and  Frank  Bond  into  the  company. 

The  first  record  we  have  of  the  Forbes  Wool  Company 
tells  of  a  trip  that  George  Bond  made  to  Trinidad  early  in 
May  of  1903  while  he  was  still  living  in  Wagon  Mound.  He 
visited  J.  C.  Huddelson  at  the  First  National  Bank  of  Trini- 
dad and  borrowed  $10,000  on  an  8  per  cent  note  due  in  three 
months.  With  this  money  in  his  pocket,  he  called  on  E.  J. 
Huling  who  was  at  the  time  manager  of  the  Forbes  Wool 
Company  and  paid  him  the  $10,000  for  stock  in  behalf  of 
himself  and  Frank  Bond.  Illustrating  the  informality  of  the 
transaction,  Huling  did  not  happen  to  have  the  Forbes  stock 
certificate  books  at  Trinidad,  so  Bond  simply  accepted  a  re- 
ceipt for  the  money.  He  turned  this  receipt  over  to  Huddelson 
at  the  bank  with  the  request  that  when  Huling  delivered  the 
stock  to  the  bank  the  receipt  should  be  returned  to  Huling.3 

Only  nine  months  before  the  Bonds  bought  the  plant,  the 
"Young  Observer"  reported  that  the  Forbes  Wool  Company 
had  a  "finely  equipped  scouring  mill," 4  but  the  tenor  of  Bond's 
correspondence  on  the  subject  does  not  lend  credence  to  this 
observation.  Indeed,  the  Bonds  felt  that  it  was  absolutely 
necessary  to  make  extensive  improvements  on  the  mill,  and 
they  estimated  that  these  improvements  would  result  in  a 
saving  of  over  4  per  cent  on  the  capital  stock  in  the  handling 
of  wool  in  the  new  mill.5  Just  what  these  improvements  might 
have  been  is  not  now  apparent. 

The  mill  must  nevertheless  have  been  at  least  reasonably 
operable,  for  the  "Young  Observer"  also  reported  that  the 
Forbes  mill  enjoyed  a  very  prosperous  season  just  before  the 

1.  Interview  with  J.  E.  Davenport. 

2.  Warshauer  sold  1,500,000  pounds  of  wool  late  in  1899,  requiring  100  railroad  cars 
to  move  the  single  shipment.  The  Shepherd's  Bulletin  of  the  National  Wool  Grower? 
Association,  III,  No.  12  (December,  1898),  605. 

8.  Records,  loc.  eit. 

4.  "Young  Observer  in  New  Mexico,"  The  American  Shepherd's  Bulletin,  VII,  No.  8 
(August,  1902),  2599  (75). 

5.  Records,  loc.  cit. 


FRANK  BOND  319 

Bonds  acquired  their  interest.8  For  the  next  several  years,  at 
least  through  1905,  the  mill  scoured  about  4,000,000  pounds 
of  wool  each  year,7  but  whether  the  mill  yielded  a  profit  on 
the  scouring  in  those  years  immediately  following  the  change 
of  ownership  is  uncertain.  As  a  matter  of  fact,  even  the  com- 
plete ownership  of  the  company  in  1903  is  uncertain.  In  ad- 
dition to  the  Bonds,  the  other  stockholders  were  T.  A. 
Schomburg  and  J.  P.  Van  Heuten  with  interests  of  $1,000 
each  and  Fred  Warshauer  who  had  an  investment  of  $6,000. 
The  total  investment  of  Schomburg,  Van  Heuten,  Warshauer, 
and  the  Bonds  therefore  totals  only  $18,000 — a  highly  un- 
likely total  for  the  capital  stock.  Later  indications  are  that 
the  total  capital  was  $50,000,8  which  would  leave  $32,000  in 
stock  unaccounted  for. 

Only  Brown9  and  Ruling  were  to  know  anything  about 
Warshauer's  interest  in  the  Forbes  Wool  Company,  and 
Frank  Bond  told  Fred  Warshauer  that  Schomburg,  Van 
Heuten,  Lawrence,  and  Florsheim,  who  were  referred  to  as 
"the  other  crowd/'10  should  remain  ignorant  of  Warshauer's 
connection  with  the  scouring  mill  because  he  didn't  think  they 
could  keep  from  talking.  In  order  to  keep  Warshauer's  con- 
nection with  the  Bonds  in  this  venture  a  closely  guarded 
secret,  his  stock  was  issued  in  the  Bond  name  with  the  inten- 
tion of  transferring  it  later  to  Warshauer  although  some  legal 
way  was  sought  to  obviate  the  necessity  of  doing  even  this.11 

The  background  of  this  esoteric  arrangement  seems  to 
have  been  a  bitter  feeling  between  the  Bonds  and  the  Gross- 
Kelly  Company.  There  is  evidence  of  some  irritation  with 
H.  W.  Kelly  as  early  as  1898  when  George  Bond  at  Wagon 
Mound  received  an  order  for  hay  from  Gross-Kelly.  He 
acknowledged  the  order  and  replied  tartly : 

Try  to  have  the  matter  fixed  so  that  the  hay  will  be  received  at 
point  of  shipment  as  this  continual  claim  for  shortage  is 
neither  pleasant  nor  profitable.  Our  hay  last  year  was  all 


6.  "Young  Observer  in  New  Mexico,"  loc.  cit. 

I.  The  American  Shepherd? 8  Bulletin,  X,  No.  9    (September,  1905),  882    (34). 

8.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

9.  Presumably  of  Brown  &  Adams. 

10.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  February  25,  1903. 

II.  Ibid. 


320  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

weighed  as  it  went  into  the  cars  and  yet  on  one  car  the  Co. 
made  claim  for  over  one  ton  short,  and  to  have  this  thing  hap- 
pen over  again  we  would  prefer  not  to  do  any  hay  business.12 

The  roots  of  the  quarrel  with  Kelly,  however,  went  deeper. 
There  seem  to  have  been  certain  generally  defined  geograph- 
ical areas  which  each  of  the  major  wool  buyers  reserved,  or 
at  least  tried  to  reserve,  for  themselves,  and  any  encroach- 
ment by  other  wool  buyers  into  the  territory  was  distinctly 
unwelcome.  In  addition,  whereas  the  Bonds  sold  their  wool 
through  Boston  wool  merchants,  usually  Brown  &  Adams, 
Kelly  was  tied  up  with  manufacturers  and  couldn't  afford  to 
give  any  of  his  wool  to  a  commission  house.13  With  the  com- 
mission house  out  of  the  picture,  Kelly  could  of  course  sell  his 
wool  at  higher  prices  and  was  in  turn  able  to  pay  correspond- 
ingly higher  prices  to  the  growers.  Thus  both  Bond  and 
Brown  &  Adams  were  anxious  to  get  Kelly  to  "come  into 
line,"  market  his  wool  though  Brown  &  Adams,  and  quit 
buying  wool  at  the  higher  prices  that  Bond  couldn't  pay.14 
As  mentioned  earlier,  the  Forbes  mill  bought  wool,  scoured 
it,  and  then  sold  it  to  the  Boston  merchants ;  Brown  was  in 
Denver  at  about  the  time  the  Forbes  transaction  was  being 
considered,  he  discussed  the  matter  with  George  Bond,  and 
he  was  thoroughly  aware  of  the  Bond-Warshauer  interest. 
These  facts  all  lead  to  the  intriguing  theory  that  perhaps 
Brown  &  Adams  held  or  were  planning  to  acquire  some  of  the 
unaccounted-for  stock  in  the  Forbes  mill.  If  this  were  true, 
the  necessity  for  keeping  Kelly  in  the  dark  would  have  as- 
sumed even  greater  importance  since  Brown  &  Adams  would 
have  then  been  realizing  multiple  profits  on  wool  which  was 
processed  by  the  mill  and  then  shipped  to  them  in  Boston.  It 

12.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  H.  W.  Kelly,  September  10,   1898,  in  the  Gross-Kelly 
Business  Collection   (University  of  New  Mexico  Library,  Albuquerque).  Cited  hereafter 
as  Gross-Kelly  Papers. 

13.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  June  25,  1904. 

14.  Vide  supra,  chap,  iii,  pp.  61-62. 

Kelly's  position  of  not  selling  his  wool  through  Brown  and  Adams  had  long  been  a 
thorn  in  the  Bonds'  side ;  in  1898  George  Bond  had  complained  about  pricing  disparities 
and  appealed  to  Kelly  to  assist  in  making  an  agreement  that  would  have  the  effect  of 
pegging  wool  prices  in  Springer,  Watrous,  and  Wagon  Mound  at  the  same  level  as  those 
being  paid  in  Las  Vegas.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  H.  W.  Kelly,  June  24.  1898,  Gross- 
Kelly  Papers,  toe.  eft. 


FRANK  BOND  321 

would  seem  that  Bond  would  have  wanted  his  connection 
cloaked  also,  but  there  may  have  been  more  compelling  rea- 
sons why  Warshauer's  interest  could  not  be  disclosed  and 
Bond's  interest  was  open  to  view. 

The  entire  question  of  territorial  prerogative  and  mar- 
keting policy  reached  a  climax  at  just  about  the  same  time 
that  Bond  and  Warshauer  were  considering  the  purchase  of 
the  Forbes  Wool  Company.  George  Bond  had  a  meeting  in 
Denver  with  Brown  early  in  1903  at  which  the  possibility  of 
getting  Kelly  to  "come  into  line" 15  was  discussed.  A  meeting 
had  been  arranged  in  Boston  at  which  Robbins  and  Jacob 
Gross  were  to  meet  with  Brown  &  Adams,  presumably  in  an 
effort  to  convince  the  former  that  they  should  sell  their  wool 
through  Brown  &  Adams.  Brown  indicated  to  George  in  Den- 
ver that  if  Kelly  wanted  to  join  their  "crowd,"  perhaps  the 
Bonds  would  be  willing  to  concede  some  territory  to  Kelly  as 
an  inducement.  According  to  Frank  Bond,  in  relating  the 
event  to  Fred  Warshauer,  "George  stood  flat-footed  and  said 
that  we  would  concede  nothing  in  the  way  of  territory."16 
Frank  then  added : 

You  [Warshauer]  and  we  together  are  bigger  wool  buyers 
than  Gross-Kelly  &  Co.  and  undoubtedly  so  far  we  have  been 
much  more  successful  as  operators.  Now  we  do  not  propose  that 
Kelly  shall  "Hog"  [This  word  is  almost  illegible.]  us  out  of 
any  of  our  territory  or  You  and  we  both  ought  to  insist  that 
he  keep  out  of  the  D.  &  R.G.  section.  We  think  .  .  .  instead  of 
giving  up  to  Kelly,  he  ought  to  be  willing  to  give  up  to  us.  ... 
If  it  should  come  to  a  showdown  we  will  simply  tell  B&A. 
that  we  will  sell  our  wool  to  whomsoever  we  please,  and  we  will 
discontinue  to  do  business  with  them.  .  .  .  We  do  not  propose  to 
have  to  buy  Mr.  Kelly  in  order  to  make  him  a  peaceful  oper- 
ator, and  a  pleasant  competitor. 

We  desire  to  stay  with  Brown  &  Adams,  but  we  do  not 
wish  to  be  sold  out.  We  will  do  any  thing  that  is  fair,  but 
nothing  more.  We  trust  that  nothing  will  come  up  of  an  un- 
pleasant nature,  and  we  hope  that  B&A.  will  be  with  us  rather 
than  with  Kelly.  They  however,  are  very  anxious  to  get  Kelly 
in  line,  and  handle  his  account,  so  I  think  that  we  may  be  pre- 


15.  I.e.,  market  through  Brown  &  Adams. 

16.  Letter  Book  No,  6.  February  25,  1903. 


322  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

pared  to  be  asked  to  do  something  for  Mr.  Kelly.  Kelly  is  not 
modest  when  it  comes  to  asking  something  from  the  other 
fellow." 

Only  a  few  days  later  Frank  further  pointed  out  to  War- 
shauer  that  Brown  &  Adams  had  nothing  to  lose  if  the  Bonds 
would  make  concessions  to  Kelly  and  everything  to  gain.  He 
wrote : 

We  are  not  blind  to  the  fact  that  we  can  pull  a  much  larger 
crowd  with  us  than  Kelly  ever  can.  If  we  should  go  out  ...  we 
are  pretty  well  satisfied  that  [Solomon]  Floersheim  and  [Al- 
bert] Lawrence  would  go  with  us.  Floersheim  does  not  love  us 
but  he  fears  George.  We  would  put  up  a  combination  with 
them  and  other  parties  who  are  friendly  with  us,  that  would 
make  both  Kelly  and  B&A.  still  think  there  were  others  who 
could  and  would  buy  wool.18 

These  ruffled  feelings  were  not  soothed  in  the  least  when 
Kelly  presumably  circulated  rumors  in  Las  Vegas  that  the 
Bonds  had  bought  5,000,000  pounds  of  wool.  Frank  Bond  then 
wrote :  "He  undoubtedly  tells  them  all  that  we  have  the  heavy 
undesirable  lots  which  he  would  not  buy.  We  are  the  'Suckers' 
and  he  is  the  genius." 19 

As  a  result,  all  efforts  to  convince  Kelly  that  he  should 
market  his  wools  through  Brown  &  Adams  must  have  failed, 
or  at  least  had  only  temporary  effect,  because  from  the  middle 
of  1907  through  1915  almost  all  the  Gross-Kelly  wool  was 
shipped  to  the  Boston  wool  brokers,  Salter  Brothers  and 
Company.20 

17.  Ibid. 

18.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  February  28,  1903. 

From  the  tenor  of  his  remarks  it  would  appear  that  Frank  Bond  was  blissfully  un- 
aware that  Kelly  was  a  stockholder  in  the  Floersheim  Mercantile  Company  along  with 
Albert  Lawrence,  Arthur  M.  Blackwell,  Jacob  Gross,  and  Solomon  Floersheim  (Minute 
Book,  January  21,  1901,  p.  26,  in  the  Floersheim  Business  Collection  [University  of  New 
Mexico  Library,  Albuquerque];  ibid.,  January  20,  1903,  p.  30).  However,  five  years 
earlier,  in  1898,  when  George  appealed  to  Kelly  for  a  pricing  agreement,  he  referred  to 
Kelly's  "influence  at  Springer  and  Watrous"  (Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  H.  W.  Kelly, 
June  24,  1898,  Gross-Kelly  Papers,  loc.  cit.)  This  might  seem  to  indicate  that  perhaps 
he  did  know  something  about  the  Kelly-Floersheim-Lawrence  corporate  relationship,  but 
if  he  did  it  is  almost  inconceivable  that  he  would  have  expected  Floersheim  and  Lawrence 
to  desert  Kelly. 

19.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  February  28,  1903. 

20.  Wool  Record,  July  30,  1907,  to  December,  1915,  Gross-Kelly  Papers,  toe.  eft.  For 
discussion  of  Salter  Brothers  vide  supra,  chap,  iii,  p.  304. 


FRANK  BOND  323 

However,  wool,  like  politics,  makes  strange  bedfellows, 
and  it  was  no  later  than  the  summer  of  1904  that  Kelly,  War- 
shauer,  and  Bond  entered  into  a  three-way  combination  to 
divide  the  1904  fall  wools  and  the  1905  Espanola  spring 
wools,  Kelly  even  pushing  to  bring  Floersheim  into  the  com- 
bination.21 The  honeymoon  was  short-lived,  however,  and  by 
July,  1905,  Frank  Bond  had  wearied  of  Kelly's  carping.  When 
Kelly  objected  to  the  purchase  of  the  45,000  pound  Otero  clip 
in  Albuquerque  for  twenty-four  cents,  Bond  guaranteed  Kelly 
against  any  loss  and  told  him  that  he  didn't  wish  to  hear 
anything  more  on  the  subject,22  commenting  that  he  pre- 
ferred to  "assume  all  chances  of  loss  with  our  friend  War- 
shauer  rather  than  hear  from  Mr.  Kelly."23 

After  this  time  no  further  dealings  with  Gross-Kelly  are 
recorded  insofar  as  the  wool  business  is  concerned,  and  it  was 
not  until  1915,  almost  ten  years  later,  that  Frank  Bond  wrote 
to  H.W.Kelly  as  follows: 

I  know  that  the  kindliest  feeling  prevails  between  your  people 
and  our  people  and  I  don't  doubt  but  what  we  might  be  able 
to  be  of  some  assistance  to  one  another  in  various  ways  if  we 
tried  really  hard  to  do  so;  although  I  am  positive  we  are  not 
harmful  to  one  another  at  the  present  time.24 

Clarence  E.  Davenport  apparently  succeeded  Huling  as 
manager,  and  he  operated  the  mill  for  a  number  of  years  until 
about  1910  when  he  joined  the  Bonds  and  moved  to  Encino 
to  work  there.25 

The  next  mention  of  the  Forbes  Wool  Company  in  the 
Bond  records  appears  in  a  letter  dated  March  16, 1910,  from 
G.  W.  Bond  to  the  Bradstreet  Company  in  Albuquerque  in 
which  he  noted  that  he  and  Frank  owned  stock  in  the  Forbes 
Wool  Company,  Trinidad,  Colorado,  as  individuals.  This  ac- 
counts for  the  fact  that  no  investment  figures  appear  on  the 
books  of  any  of  the  Bond  stores  with  respect  to  the  Forbes 
company. 

21.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  June  25,  1904. 

22.  Ibid.,  July  7,  1905. 

23.  Ibid. 

24.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  February  6,  1915,  p.  703. 

25.  Interview  with  J.  E.  Davenport ;  Letter  Book  No.  55,  September  8,  1914,  p.  158. 


324  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

At  least  as  late  as  1910  the  Forbes  Wool  Company,  under 
the  managership  of  T.  G.  Chittenden  who  succeeded  Daven- 
port in  that  capacity,  was  showing  a  profit.  In  that  year,  the 
plant  handled  over  3,000,000  pounds  of  wool  and  netted  a 
profit  of  $9,046.42.  But  this  followed  a  year  that  had  closed 
with  a  cumulative  loss  to  date  of  $1,329.86.26 

Belying  the  decline  that  was  to  commence  shortly,  the 
financial  condition  of  the  Forbes  Wool  Company  on  March 
28,  1911,  appeared  as  shown  in  Table  48.  An  examination  of 
the  income  and  expenses  for  this  year  reveals  that  the  profit 
was  realized  from  sorting,  scouring,  and  burring  wool,  with 
no  indication  that  any  profit  whatsoever  was  gained  from  the 
buying  and  selling  of  wool. 

TABLE  48 

STATEMENT,  FORBES  WOOL  COMPANY 

March  28, 1911 

Resources 

Amount 

Cash  $  4,005.66 

Inventory8   469.09 

Accounts  Receivable 3,726.95b 

Fixed  Plant  49,514.86 

Wool  Advances  19,592.88 

Total  $77,309.44 

Liabilities 

Bills  Payable  $19,592.88 

Capital  Stock 50,000.00 

Surplus  7,716.56 

Total  $77,309.44 

*  Soap  and  sacks. 
•»  All  good. 

The  following  year,  1912,  told  a  different  story.  In  spite 
of  Chittenden's  hope  that  "should  we  get  as  much  wool  to 
scour  this  year  as  last,  we  should  be  able  to  make  a  somewhat 
better  showing,"27  the  income  from  the  scouring  work  fell 
from  $37,516.61  to  $1,828.55,  and  the  year  ended  with  a  net 
loss  of  $469.21.28 

26.  Records,  loe.  eit. 

27.  Ibid. 

28.  Records,  loc.  eit. 


FRANK  BOND  325 

The  plight  of  the  Forbes  Wool  Company  worsened 
steadily.  In  1914  Frank  Bond  charged  off  a  loss  of  $4,691.24 
on  the  Forbes  Wool  Company  on  his  personal  books,29  and  by 
this  time  he  was  carrying  his  investment  in  the  company  at 
a  mere  $750.30 

Operations  during  1914  must  have  been  the  last  straw 
for  Frank  Bond  for  by  February,  1915,  he  was  convinced 
that  it  was  hopeless  to  attempt  operating  the  plant,  and  he 
favored  closing  it  down  entirely  and  selling  the  building  and 
machinery  for  what  they  could  get.31  In  April  he  wrote  his 
brother : 

It  would  suit  me  for  them  to  scrap  the  whole  thing  and  get 
what  they  can  for  it.  If  you  feel  the  same  about  it,  I  wish  you 
would  write  them.  ...  If  they  continue  another  year,  they  will 
be  calling  on  the  stockholders  to  pay  the  expenses,  and  for 
what  purpose?  It  would  simply  be  throwing  money  into  a 
hole.32 

The  last  mention  of  the  Forbes  Wool  Company  before  the 
close  of  1915  was  one  more  try  on  the  part  of  Frank  Bond 
to  recognize  a  losing  proposition  when  he  saw  one.  In  June 
he  summed  up  its  inevitable  demise  in  a  letter  to  J.  C.  Hud- 
delson  who  was  then  president  of  the  Forbes  Wool  Company, 
saying : 

There  is  very  little  scouring  done  in  the  west  any  more,  as  the 
general  run  of  the  wools  can  be  sold  to  better  advantage  in  the 
grease,  and  furthermore  it  is  very  doubtful  that  it  will  ever 
become  a  popular  way  of  handling  our  wools  again  to  any 
extent.33 

9.  Bond,  McCarthy  Company 

In  1863  a  young  Prussian  teenager  named  Alexander 
Gusdorf  came  west  to  Santa  Fe.  Starting  work  for  A.  Stabb 
in  Santa  Fe,  he  soon  struck  out  on  his  own  and  opened  his  own 
general  merchandise  store  at  Penasco.  Alex  soon  moved  to 
Ranches  de  Taos  and  opened  up  a  flour  mill,  then  ultimately 

29.  Ibid. 

30.  Ibid. 

31.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  February  6,  1915,  p.  4. 

32.  Ibid.,  April  17,  1915,  p.  612. 

33.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  June  4,  1915,  p.  399. 


326  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Taos  itself  saw  a  general  store  bearing  the  name  of  Gusdorf.1 
During  this  time  his  younger  immigrant  half  brother,  Gerson 
Gusdorf ,  was  stranded  in  New  York  City  by  the  death  of  his 
uncle  with  whom  he  had  been  living,  and  at  the  age  of  four- 
teen Gerson,  like  Alex  before  him,  traveled  westward, 
joining  the  family  at  Ranches  de  Taos.2 

Meanwhile,  an  undertaker  named  T.  G.  McCarthy  re- 
ceived into  his  home  in  Pueblo,  Colorado,  a  brother  by  the 
name  of  Justin  H.  McCarthy  who  had  trekked  westward  in 
1898.  Before  long,  young  Justin  learned  that  an  opening  as 
a  bookkeeper  existed  in  a  general  store  in  Espanola  which 
was  operated  by  George  W.  Bond  and  Frank  Bond.  He  suc- 
cessfully applied  for  the  position  and  thus  began  a  business 
association  that  lasted  until  1932.3 

The  Gusdorf  store  at  Taos  prospered,  but  Alexander  Gus- 
dorf's  sixteen-year-old  son,  Melvin,  died  near  the  turn  of  the 
century,  and  the  grieving  parents  rapidly  lost  the  drive  and 
will  so  necessary  to  the  successful  operation  of  a  business 
during  those  times.4  Undoubtedly  it  was  through  their  mutual 
friend,  Staab,  that  young  Gerson  Gusdorf  came  to  know  the 
Bond  brothers,  so  when  Alexander  Gusdorf  began  to  think 
of  selling  out,  the  team  of  Bond,  Gerson  Gusdorf,  and  Justin 
H.  McCarthy  began  to  emerge. 

The  basic  transactions  took  place  on  September  12,  1904, 
which  put  the  three  new  partners  into  business.  McCarthy 
gave  his  note  to  the  Bonds  for  $1,436.66  and  secured  $3,- 
563.34  from  the  Pueblo  National  Bank.  Whether  this  latter 
sum  was  a  withdrawal  of  his  own  funds  or  received  on  a  note 
to  the  bank  is  unknown.  Gerson  Gusdorf  added  $3,700  to  the 
$5,000  put  in  by  McCarthy,  and  George  and  Frank  Bond 
supplied  a  $10,000  note  dated  September  1  in  favor  of  Alex- 
ander Gusdorf  and  $4,800  in  cash  to  make  up  the  $23,500 
which  the  new  owners  paid  to  Alexander  Gusdorf5  for  a 
business  with  an  inventory  value  of  $23,800  including  less 

1.  Interview  with  Mrs.  Elsie  Gusdorf  Weimer,  Taos,  New  Mexico,  January  10,  1958. 

2.  Interview  with  Mrs.  Gerson  Gusdorf,  Taos,  New  Mexico,  January  10,  1958. 
8.  Interview  with  John  F.  McCarthy. 

4.  Interview  with  Mrs.  Elsie  Gusdorf  Weimer. 

6.  Cash  Book  and  Journal,  September,  1904  (in  the  files  of  John  F.  McCarthy,  Taoa, 
New  Mexico).  Material  at  Taos  cited  hereafter  as  McCarthy  Papers. 


FRANK  BOND  327 

than  $100  worth  of  scales,  jewelry  cases,  a  cigar  case,  a  hat 
case,  and  other  fixtures.6  In  order  to  set  the  business  on  firm 
ground,  the  Bonds  supplied  another  $5,000  in  cash  for  the 
business  to  use.7 

Business  started  off  promptly  the  next  day,  September 
13,  1904,  when  cash  sales  amounted  to  $215  and  John  Dunn 
bought  $25  worth  of  merchandise  on  account.8 

Actual  incorporation  of  the  new  firm  did  not  occur  until 
October  25,  1904,  when  George  Bond,  Frank  Bond,  Gusdorf , 
and  McCarthy  associated  themselves  together  under  the  pro- 
visions of  Chapter  I,  Title  5  of  the  Compiled  Laws  of  New 
Mexico  of  1887.9  The  name  "Bond,  Gusdorf,  McCarthy  Com- 
pany" was  adopted  and  Frank  Bond,  Gusdorf,  and  McCarthy 
elected  themselves  president,  vice-president,  and  secretary, 
treasurer,  and  general  manager.  The  Articles  of  Incorpora- 
tion disclose  the  purpose  for  which  the  business  was  organ- 
ized, and  they  describe  so  well  not  only  the  Taos  store  but 
also  most  of  the  other  Bond  organizations,  that  the  object 
of  the  business  is  quoted  verbatim : 

To  buy,  sell,  exchange,  barter,  deal  in  and  incumber  wool, 
hides,  pelts,  sheep,  cattle,  horses  and  other  livestock,  and  the 
products  thereof,  and  to  buy,  sell,  exchange,  barter,  deal  in 
and  incumber  all  kinds  and  classes  of  goods,  wares,  and  mer- 
chandise, and  to  operate  and  carry  on  a  general  merchandise 
business.10 

The  store  was  capitalized  at  $30,000,  the  stock  consisting 
of  one  dollar  par  value  shares.  Ten  thousand  shares  were 
issued  to  McCarthy,  and  a  like  amount  to  Gerson  Gusdorf; 
Frank  and  George  Bond  divided  the  remaining  10,000  shares 
between  them  equally.11  That  the  partners  divided  the  stock 
in  this  manner  despite  the  unequal  cash  contributions  made 
as  described  above  strongly  indicates  that  the  organizational 
pattern  here  closely  followed  that  of  the  other  stores  where 

6.  Ibid. 

7.  Ibid. 

8.  Ibid. 

9.  Articles  of  Incorporation,  McCarthy  Papers,  toe.  eit. 

10.  Ibid. 

11.  Minutes  of  Board  of  Directors'  Meeting,  November  15,  1904,  McCarthy  Papers, 
toe.  cit. 


328  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

the  other  partners'  interests  were  given  in  return  for  the 
security  of  a  personal  note  payable  to  the  Bonds.  However, 
they  executed  a  formal  agreement  not  to  sell  their  stock  to 
any  outsider  without  first  offering  it  to  the  other  shareholders 
on  the  same  terms.12 

The  size  of  the  merchandise  investment  carried  by  the 
Bond,  Gusdorf ,  McCarthy  Company  and  later  by  Bond,  Mc- 
Carthy was  a  continual  source  of  irritation  to  Frank  Bond 
who  felt  that  the  business  could  be  well  conducted  on  a  lesser 
stock  of  merchandise.  Bond  wrote  of  his  concern  in  1905 13 
and  again  at  the  end  of  1908  when  he  pointed  out  that  the 
stock  investment  was  up  to  $55,000  and  as  much  business 
could  be  done  on  $40,000.14  In  1913,  Frank  Bond  pressed 
McCarthy  hard  again  on  the  subject.15  Indeed,  the  stock  in- 
vestment averaged  just  under  $51,000  for  the  period  from 
organization  through  1915,  and  the  year  which  reflected  the 
greatest  profits,  1915,  closed  with  a  stock  investment  of  only 
$39,900,  surprisingly  close  to  Frank  Bond's  estimate.16 

Furniture  and  Fixtures,  which  averaged  about  $4,000, 
were  valued  at  90  per  cent  of  cost  in  consonance  with  their 
usual  practice,  and  there  were  no  significant  changes  to  the 
account  between  1904  and  1915. 

Renting  sheep  was  not  one  of  the  major  activities  in  Taos, 
there  rarely  being  more  than  $100  or  so  tied  up  in  rented 
sheep  until  1912  when  the  sheep  account  began  to  grow.  By 
1915  Bond,  McCarthy  had  $12,800  invested  in  sheep,  repre- 
senting 3,640  head,  and  by  that  time  some  profit  on  this  phase 
of  the  business  was  beginning  to  be  realized.17 

Cash  was  usually  short,  the  bank  balances  were  small, 
and  accounts  and  bills  receivable  comprised  the  important 
part  of  the  current  assets  aside  from  merchandise.  Those 
accounts  which  by  specific  analysis  were  expected  to  be  un- 
collectible were  charged  off  at  the  end  of  the  year,  but  a  note 
of  year-end  pessimism  in  this  respect  is  evident  since  a  goodly 

12.  Records,  loe.  eit. 

13.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  June  9,  1905. 

14.  Ibid.,  January  13,  1909. 

16.  Letter  Book  No.  50,  October  16,  1913,  p.  83. 

16.  Records,  lac.  cit. 

17.  Ibid. 


FRANK  BOND  329 

portion  of  these  were  frequently  collected  in  the  following 
year  and  were  reflected  as  profit.  These  data  are  tabulated 
in  Table  49. 

TABLE  49 

BOND,  MCCARTHY  RECEIVABLES  ACTIVITY 

(dollars  in  thousands) 

Year  Receivables  Charged  Off  Collected  in 

Succeeding  Year 

1905  $35.7  $1.6  $ 

1906  44.2  3.4 

1907  51.5  8.5 

1908  51.1  2.5 

1909  49.7  3.0  1.1 

1910  45.4  .2  2.1 

1911  56.1  5.0  1.2 

1912  58.4  5.1  3.0 

1913  62.9  2.4  2.3 

1914  66.8  2.8  2.6 

1915  63.9  2.6 

Minor  balance  sheet  items  included  horses,18  cattle,  a  few 
hides  and  pelts,  and  some  of  the  camp  buildings  at  Servilleta. 

Like  the  assets,  there  were  no  violent  fluctuations  in  the 
liabilities;  bills  payable  constituted  a  significant  share  and 
generally  amounted  to  between  $25,000  and  $30,000.  It  was 
a  typical  mercantile  store,  and  there  was  always  from  $3,000 
to  $9,000  in  payables  to  depositors.19 

In  June  of  1905,  the  year  following  organization,  Frank 
Bond  heard  that  McCarthy  had  tried  his  hand  at  politics  and, 
having  run,  failed  to  acquire  office.  This  was  the  occasion  of 
a  rebuke  reflecting  a  Bond  point  of  view  which  explains  in 
many  ways  the  background  role  they  played  in  the  political 
life  of  New  Mexico : 

We  have  never  mixed  politics  or  religion  in  our  business  and 
we  certainly  do  not  wish  you  to  do  so. ...  Keep  a  still  mouth  as 
regards  politics  or  religion.  They  have  nothing  to  do  with  busi- 
ness, and  buy  carefully  and  judiciously  and  you  will  be  sure  to 
make  a  success.20 


18.  In  1905,  1906  and  1907  a  $280  investment  included  two  sets  of  harness,  one  team, 
and  one  buggy. 

19.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

20.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  June  9,  1906. 


330  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

At  the  same  time  Bond  took  the  opportunity  to  caution  him 
about  over-buying  on  shoes,  advising  that  he  would  have  to 
meet  his  own  bills  and  not  expect  help.  This  kind  of  advice 
was  a  normal  part  of  Bond's  general  supervision  from  Es- 
panola  and  punctuated  his  efforts  to  make  the  local  store 
managers  pay  their  way  without  additional  financial  assist- 
ance from  Espanola.  On  the  other  hand,  it  is  observed  that 
however  dire  the  threat,  money  was  always  forthcoming 
when  there  was  a  real  need.21 

The  profits  at  the  end  of  1905,  covering  the  sixteen  months 
of  operation  since  September  of  the  previous  year,  amounted 
to  $17,274.61  which  was  distributed  $5,758.20  each  to  Mc- 
Carthy and  Gusdorf  with  a  like  amount  being  divided  be- 
tween the  Bonds,  a  very  respectable  return  on  invested 
capital.22  These  profits  were  distributed  at  the  end  of  1905, 
and  it  is  noted  that  they  were  never  distributed  in  cash.  They 
were,  in  fact,  returned  to  the  stock  account  at  the  end  of 
1906.23  At  the  end  of  1905,  too,  the  capital  stock  of  Bond, 
Gusdorf,  McCarthy  Company  was  increased  from  $30,000  to 
$40,000  by  the  contribution  of  $10,000  in  sheep  by  the  Bonds 
who  in  return  received  5,000  more  shares  of  stock  each.24 

The  profits  over  the  years  from  organization  through 
1915  are  shown  in  Table  50. 

By  the  end  of  1907,  profits  had  continued  to  remain  de- 
pressed, and  Gerson  Gusdorf  sold  his  interest  in  the  business 
to  the  remaining  partners.  By  this  time  Gusdorf  had  accumu- 
lated $7,617.55  in  profits  which,  added  to  his  $10,000  capital 
stock  interest,  enabled  him  to  pay  the  Bonds  the  $14,583.79 
which  he  owed  on  two  notes  and  thus  leave  the  business  with 
just  over  $3,000  in  cash.25  In  this  transaction  the  Bonds 
acquired  6,666  shares.26  J.  H.  McCarthy  acquired  3,333 
shares,  and  one  share  was  issued  to  the  bookkeeper,  Charles 
J.  H.  Robinson,  probably  to  provide  a  third  officer  of  the 

21.  Supra,  chap.  vli. 

22.  Journal,  December,  1905,  McCarthy  Papers,  loe.  cit. 

23.  Journal,  December,  1906,  McCarthy  Papers,  tec.  cit.  Taxes  for  1905  amounted  to 
just  $145.80. 

24.  Journal,  December,  1905,  McCarthy  Papers,  loc.  cit. 
26.  Journal,  January,  1908,  McCarthy  Papers,  lac.  cit. 
26.  Divided  equally  between  Frank  and  George  Bond. 


FRANK  BOND  331 

TABLE  50 

BOND,  MCCARTHY  NET  PROFITS 

(dollars  in  thousands) 


Year 

Amount 

1905  

$17.3 

1906  

5.4 

1907  

5.1 

1908  

9.1 

1909  

8.3 

1910  

1.5 

1911  

8.9 

1912  

15.6 

1913  

7.7 

1914  

13.0 

1915  ... 

18.7 

company.27  Again,  the  McCarthy  stock  was  financed  by  the 
Bonds,  and  so  the  ownership  now  stood  as  shown  in  Table  51. 

TABLE  51 

BOND,  MCCARTHY  STOCKHOLDERS 

Stockholder  Shares  Held 

G.  W.  Bond  13,333 

Frank  Bond 13,333 

J.  H.  McCarthy 13,333 

C.  J.  H.  Robinson 1 

Total  40.000 

A  serious  slump  in  profits  occurred  in  1910,  and  Frank 
Bond  didn't  expect  McCarthy's  health  to  permit  his  continu- 
ance in  the  business  beyond  that  year.28  He  suggested  that  if 
it  did  become  necessary  to  make  a  change  at  Taos  that  they 
might  give  one  man  stock  in  the  company  and  the  other  a 
percentage  of  the  profits.  Even  though  this  never  material- 

27.  Journal,  January,  1908,  McCarthy  Papers,  loc.  cit.  Most  of  the  records  of  the 
company  were  destroyed  by  a  fire  in  1932  that  consumed  an  entire  city  block  in  Taos. 
Unanswered,  as  a  result,  is  the  question  of  when  the  name  of  Gusdorf  was  dropped  from 
the  corporate  entity.  Certificate  No.  1  of  the  Bond,  McCarthy  Company  was  not  issued 
until  February,  1916,  so  it  is  possible  that  the  Gusdorf  name  continued  until  that  time 
in  a  legal  sense  although  after  1907  the  firm  is  always  referred  to  in  the  correspondence 
as  Bond,  McCarthy. 

28.  McCarthy's  health  apparently  improved  for  he  continued  in  active  partnership 
with  the  Bonds  for  many  years  afterward.  Mrs.  McCarthy,  however,  contracted  mumps 
and  died  in  premature  childbirth  on  April  16,  1915,  leaving  Justin  and  their  five  small 
children.  Frank  Bond,  Louis  Nohl,  and  Andy  Wiest  went  immediately  to  McCarthy's 
side  in  Taos  and  then  as  he  returned  his  wife  to  Chicago  for  burial  all  three  of  them 
accompanied  McCarthy  on  the  train  as  far  as  Pueblo,  Colorado.  Letter  Book  No.  57, 
April  17,  1916,  p.  610. 


332  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ized,  it  did  indicate  that  a  change  in  the  way  in  which  the 
managers  were  employed  was  considered.29 

Also  under  consideration  at  this  time  was  the  possibility 
of  purchasing  the  stock  of  the  Taos  Mercantile  Company.  The 
Santa  Barbara  Tie  and  Pole  Company  was  interested  also, 
and  Bond  suggested  that  they  offer  sixty-five  cents  on  the 
dollar  for  the  Taos  stock  and  then  throw  out  the  undesirable 
items.  If  they  did  finally  buy  it,  they  planned  to  close  the  store 
at  once  and  lock  it  up  because  they  feared  that  the  sellers 
might  go  in  and  remove  a  large  part  of  the  stock  if  it  were 
left  unguarded.30  However,  there  is  no  indication  that  this 
transaction  was  ever  consummated. 

The  year  1912  turned  out  excellently,  and  the  higher 
profits  were  due  not  only  to  slightly  greater  earnings  on  mer- 
chandise sales  but  also  to  wool  trading  in  an  even  greater 
degree.  In  this  year  there  was  over  $9,000  profit  reported  on 
wool  in  contrast  to  no  profit  at  all  two  years  previously  when, 
in  1910,  profits  were  so  very  low.  However,  total  sales  of 
$97,600  in  1912  were  not  too  far  above  the  $94,000  total  sales 
of  1910.31 

Nineteen  thirteen  ended  badly,  and  in  October  Frank 
Bond  was  prompted  to  remark  that  it  was  the  hardest  year 
of  his  experience.32  He  punctuated  his  distress  by  trying  to 

32.  Letter  Book  No.  50,  October  16,  1913,  p.  81. 

spur  McCarthy  on  to  exert  his  best,  cautioning  him  to  start 
paying  dividends,  "otherwise  what  is  the  use  in  being  in 
business?"33  To  make  matters  worse,  it  was  about  this  time 
that  in  receiving  a  shipment  of  sheep,  it  seems  that  someone 
opened  the  loading  pens  and  let  some  sheep  back  into  an 
uncounted  bunch,  so  they  bought  them  again.34  McCarthy,  of 
course,  had  to  stand  his  share  of  the  loss,  and  what  with 
merchandise  profits  being  off  more  than  $4,000  the  year 
turned  out  rather  disastrously.  However,  as  can  be  seen  from 
Table  50,  supra,  the  last  two  years  of  the  period  told  a  differ- 
ent and  more  cheerful  story. 

29.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  March  16,  1910. 

80.  Ibid. 

31.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

33.  Ibid.,  p.  83. 

34.  Ibid.,  October  30,  1913,  p.  178. 


FRANK  BOND  333 

After  the  poor  showing  in  1913  the  belt  was  tightened  and 
salaries  were  cut.  Among  them  was  the  bookkeeper's35  salary 
which  was  reduced  to  $100  per  month.  Frank  Bond  felt  that 
this  was  enough  for  a  bookkeeper  anyway.  He  quit.36  This  is 
not  to  say,  however,  that  salary-cutting  was  a  favorite  form 
of  amusement  engaged  in  just  to  increase  profits.  Indeed,  the 
contrary  is  illustrated  by  an  incident  that  occurred  in  early 
1909.  Robinson's  salary  had  been  raised  by  George  Bond,  the 
increase  amounting  to  $16.66  per  month.  Justin  McCarthy 
had  not  fully  agreed  with  this  increase,  and  George  felt  that 
his  attitude  as  a  result  was  cold  and  distant.  He  stated  that 
"there  must  be  no  friction  between  us"37  and  promptly  ar- 
ranged to  pay  the  increase  himself  out  of  his  own  pocket. 
This  type  of  action  was  not  at  all  unusual  within  the  Bond 
organization,  particularly  if  it  helped  to  prevent  any  type  of 
friction,  misunderstanding,  or  whisper  of  unfairness. 

Wool  activities  on  the  Taos  books  were  generally  low. 
This  was  due  to  the  fact  that  most  of  McCarthy's  wool  activi- 
ties were  handled  separately  on  a  joint  account  with  Bond 
and  the  Warshauer-McClure  Sheep  Company  of  Antonito. 
Taos  wools  were  among  the  riskiest  wools  handled  by  Bond, 
and  in  1915  he  completed  an  agreement  with  Brown  & 
Adams  of  Boston  under  the  terms  of  which  they  would  guar- 
antee Bond  against  loss  on  his  wools,  give  him  the  first  cent  of 
profit,  take  the  next  half  cent  for  themselves,  and  give  Bond 
the  balance  if  any.  In  completing  this  arrangement,  Bond 
was  careful  to  keep  Taos  wools  out  of  the  agreement  in  order 
that  the  profit  on  Espanola  or  Antonito  wools  might  not  have 
to  cover  losses  on  the  Taos  wools.38  Taos  wool  was  to  be  set 
up  in  a  separate  agreement  and  Justin  McCarthy  was  not  at 
all  pleased.  This  prompted  Frank  Bond  to  reply : 

You  know  that  I  always  handle  wool  and  sheep  business 
that  [sic]  same  as  if  it  were  my  own,  and  I  believe  so  far  I 
have  not  made  many  mistakes,  at  least  you  have  always  made 
some  money,  but  I  am  bound  to  guess  wrong  some  time,  and  I 


35.  Named  Thompson,  first  initials  unknown. 

36.  Letter  Book  No.  51,  February  24,  1914,  p.  274. 

37.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  January  13,  1909. 

88.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  February  8,  1915,  p.  12  ;  ibid.,  February  9,  1915,  p.  33. 


334  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

just  wish  to  say  that  any  time  you  desire  I  will  turn  it  over  to 
you,  and  you  can  make  your  own  deals,  not  that  I  desire  to 
get  rid  of  the  trouble,  as  I  am  perfectly  willing  to  stay  with 
the  job  as  long  as  it  is  agreeable  to  you.39 

A  few  weeks  later  Bond  forwarded  McCarthy  $5,000, 
representing  the  profit  on  Taos  wools.  Bond  shared  his 
half  of  the  profit,  as  usual,  with  Warshauer-McClure.40 

These  rebukes  to  his  managers  were  actually  very 
straightforward  expressions  of  opinion.  While  they  occurred 
not  infrequently,  they  were  calculated  to  train  the  managers 
in  Bond  policy  and  philosophy.  In  setting  up  the  various  or- 
ganizations, the  Bonds  selected  men  who  had  exihibited 
promise  of  being  able  to  follow  their  own  pattern  of  business 
practice,  helped  them  get  started,  steered  them  along  the  way, 
and  ultimately  saw  them  go  out  on  their  own.  After  sending 
one  tart  letter,  Bond  soothed  McCarthy : 

We  did  not  start  you  in  Taos  just  with  the  selfish  motive  of 
improving  our  own  fortunes  but  also  of  helping  out  a  deserv- 
ing man.  The  time  will  come  when  you  don't  need  our  backing 
.  . .  when  that  time  comes,  we  will  sell  out  to  you  and  wish  you 
well." 

They  did,  too,  twenty-three  years  later. 


10.  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  Mercantile  Company 

The  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  Mercantile  Company,  Encino, 
New  Mexico,  was  organized  in  1905  by  G.  W.  Bond  and  Frank 
Bond.  The  brothers  were  equal  partners  in  the  new  company, 
but  one  share  of  stock  was  issued  to  Louis  F.  Nohl  in  order 
to  qualify  him  for  the  post  of  secretary  and  treasurer  to 
which  he  was  elected  at  the  first  directors'  meeting  on  No- 
vember 5, 1905.1  The  election  of  G.  W.  Bond  as  president  and 

39.  Ibid.,  February  8,  1915,  p.  31. 

40.  Ibid.,  March  25,  1915,  p.  466  ;  ibid.,  p.  468. 

41.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  January  13,  1909. 

1.  Almost  thirteen  years  later  Frank  Bond  wrote:  "I  enclose  .  .  .  certificate  No.  6 
for  one  share  of  ...  stock  issued  to  Louis  F.  Nohl.  This  share  of  stock  was  originally 
issued  to  Mr.  Nohl  without  consideration  to  qualify  him  to  act  as  an  officer  of  the  Com- 
pany. Now  that  Mr.  Nohl  is  dead  the  stock  should  revert  to  the  corporation."  Letter  of 
Frank  Bond  to  Clarence  E.  Davenport,  Encino,  April  80,  1918,  Bond  Papers,  loe.  eit. 


FRANK  BOND  335 

Frank  Bond  as  vice-president  completed  the  directorate 
which  continued  without  change  until  Mr.  Nohl's  death  thir- 
teen years  later.2 

The  business  was  capitalized  at  $25,000  with  25,000 
shares  of  stock  authorized  and  issued,  and  additional  finan- 
cial support  was  provided  by  a  loan  of  $33,180.39  from  G.  W. 
Bond  &  Bro.,  Espanola.  This  loan  was  paid  off  in  1910  when 
the  accumulated  undivided  profits  had  very  nearly  reached 
that  figure.3  The  only  other  inter-company  complication 
affecting  the  Encino  store  occurred  in  July,  1914,  when  the 
G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  Mercantile  Company  joined  the  A.  Mac- 
Arthur  Company,  the  Bond  &  Nohl  Company,  and  the  Bond, 
McCarthy  Company  and  became  a  stockholder  in  the  Bond- 
Connell  Sheep  and  Wool  Company,  owning  5,000  shares  of 
stock.4  This  represented  the  only  investment  in  outside  com- 
panies during  the  period,  and  the  loan  from  Espanola  was 
the  only  major  outside  financial  support  the  business  in  En- 
cino ever  required  in  that  time. 

Charles  A.  Scheurich,  a  native  of  Taos,  was  appointed 
general  manager  of  the  new  store,  and  his  salary  was  fixed 
at  $100  per  month.  He  was  instructed : 

Proceed  at  once  to  secure  a  desirable  location  at  Encino,  Tor- 
ranee  County,  New  Mexico,  for  store  building  &c.,  and  immedi- 
ately purchase  lumber  in  the  best  market  possible,  for  the 
erection  of  buildings,  and  secure  carpenters  to  erect  buildings 
suitable  for  a  General  Merchandise  business  to  be  carried  on 
at  Encino.5 

Scheurich  went  to  Encino,  and  the  store  was  duly  built  on  six 
acres  of  land  across  the  street  from  the  Santa  Fe  Railroad 
tracks  at  an  initial  cost  of  $5,400.6 

The  company  was  formed  for  the  express  purpose  of 
operating  a  general  merchandise  store  at  Encino,  but  it  is 
observed  that  the  registered  offices  of  the  company  were 
never  there.  They  remained  in  Espanola  until  1918  when 

2.  Record  of  Minutes  (in  the  files  of  Frank  Bond  &  Son,  Inc.,  Albuquerque) . 

3.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

4.  Infra.,  chap.  xiii. 

5.  Record  of  Minutes,  loc.  cit. 

6.  Records,  loc.  cit. 


336  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

they  were  moved  to  Albuquerque.  This  anomaly  is  further 
highlighted  by  the  corporate  seal  which  was  adopted  by  the 
directors  at  their  first  meeting.  It  read:  "G.  W.  Bond  and 
Brother  Mercantile  Company,  Encino,  Torrance  County, 
N.  M."7  The  confusion  is  completed  by  the  actual  impression 
of  the  seal  which  was  pressed  into  the  corporate  minutes.  It 
read:  "G.  W.  Bond  and  Brother  Mercantile  Company,  Es- 
panola,  Rio  Arriba  County,  N.  M." 8 

The  new  company  was  officially  formed  on  November  5, 
1905,  with  the  first  meeting  of  the  board  of  directors  although 
it  had  opened  its  doors  for  business  on  October  11.  However, 
it  was  not  until  April  of  the  following  year  that  stock  certifi- 
cates were  issued,  and  the  first  meeting  of  the  stockholders 
did  not  take  place  until  September,  1906.  This  lack  of  atten- 
tion to  relatively  minor  corporate  details  might  with  respect 
to  most  businesses  in  New  Mexico's  early  days  appear  to  be 
trivial,  but  in  the  light  of  Frank  Bond's  firm  policy  that  such 
matters  be  attended  to  promptly  it  is  enigmatic,  and  perhaps 
it  foreshadowed  the  rocky  road  which  the  Encino  business 
was  destined  to  travel,  ending  many  years  later  in  misunder- 
standing, heartbreak,  and  insolvency. 

The  Bonds  gave  Scheurich  a  salary,  the  title  of  General 
Manager,  and  a  mandate  to  build  a  store  in  Encino.  It  ap- 
pears, however,  from  the  correspondence  that  shortly  after 
relinquishing  active  management  of  the  store  in  Wagon 
Mound,  George  Bond  spent  a  great  deal  of  his  time  at  Encino. 
That  it  was  only  part-time  supervision  though  is  indicated 
by  the  fact  that  his  family  remained  in  Trinidad.9  This  con- 
tinued in  varying  degree  until  the  brothers  decided  to  dissolve 
their  Espanola  partnership — George  moving  to  Boise,  Idaho. 

7.  Record  of  Minutes,  lor.  cit. 

8.  Ibid. 

9.  A  letter  written  in  1907  by  Frank  Bond  to  George  in  Encino  (Letter  Book  No.  6, 
September  17,  1907)  mentioned  that  George's  wife,  Agnes   (Frank  called  her  "Aggie."), 
was  in  Trinidad.  It  appears  that  after  George  moved  his  family  from  Wagon  Mound  to 
Trinidad  he  spent  a  great  deal  of  time  at  Encino.  Scheurich  was,  of  course,  running  the 
store,  but  George  Bond  had  to  take  care  of  the  sheep  and  wool  business  in  the  area  for 
G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.,  Espanola.  As  soon  as  they  were  able  to  get  a  man  in  who  could 
handle  sheep  and  wool  as  well  as  the  merchandise  line,  it  seems  that  George  returned 
to  Trinidad  although  he  wrote  letters  from  Encino  as  late  as  January,  1910.  Other  cor- 
respondence during  these  years  reveals  George's  presence  in   Trinidad  and  San  Diego 
as  well. 


FRANK  BOND  337 

During  the  first  two  years  of  operation  the  Encino  ven- 
ture was  limited  fairly  well  to  the  mercantile  business  al- 
though hides  and  pelts  were  a  minor  source  of  income  from 
the  start  and  continued  to  be  so.10  Beans,  cattle,  lumber,  and 
interest  were  also  minor  sources  of  earnings. 

When  the  Encino  store  was  established  it  was  agreed  that 
interest  of  6  per  cent  would  be  paid  to  the  stockholders  on 
their  capital  stock  investment  and  charged  off  as  an  expense 
of  the  business  and  that  the  remaining  profits  would  not  be 
divided  until  such  time  as  it  might  be  possible  to  declare  a 
100  per  cent  dividend — or  by  mutual  consent.11  These  profits 
on  the  new  business  started  off  rather  well,  and  except  for 
1913  when  net  profits  amounted  to  the  magnificent  sum  of 
$174.41  they  continued  so.  At  the  end  of  1915,  after  ten  years 
of  operation,  undivided  profits  had  accumulated  in  the 
amount  of  $94,333.27.  Since  no  profits  had  been  withdrawn 
except  the  6  per  cent  annual  interest  paid  on  investment,  the 
total  profit  picture  for  the  ten  years  amounted  to  $15,000 
more  than  this,  or  almost  $110,000  for  an  average  annual 
earning  of  $11,000.12 

Table  52  shows  the  net  profits  for  the  years  from  organ- 
ization through  1915  and  includes  the  6  per  cent  interest  on 
$25,000  capital  stock  which  was  not  considered  by  them  to 
be  profit. 

It  is  a  little  surprising,  therefore,  to  discover  that  on 
September  17,  1907,  less  than  two  years  after  the  founding, 
Frank  Bond  wrote  his  brother  in  Encino  suggesting  that  they 
sell  the  Encino  store.  It  certainly  could  not  have  been  the 
profit  picture  at  that  time,  and  indeed  Frank  suggested  that 
the  investment  in  "this  other  thing"  was  much  larger  and 
required  careful  "nursing  and  watching."13  Just  exactly 
what  the  other  investment  was  to  which  he  alluded  is  un- 
known, but  the  urgency  of  the  matter  apparently  passed  for 

10.  In  a  letter  to  Walter  Connell   (Letter  Book  No.  58,  May  1,  1915,  p.  16)    Frank 
Bond  wrote:  "Dick  Dillon  seems  to  be  a  puzzle  to  all  of  us,  the  way  he  handles  his  pelt 
business."  Dillon  had  just  sold  his  pelts  for  17%,  cents.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  March  9, 
1915,  p.  811. 

11.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  January  4,  1908,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. ; 
Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  July  25,  1911,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

12.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

13.  Letter  Book  No.  6,  September  17,  1907. 


338  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

TABLE  52 

G.  W.  BOND  &  BRO.  MERCANTILE  COMPANY  EARNINGS 
(dollars  in  thousands) 

Year  Amount 

1906 $  4.1 

1907 7.3 

1908 3.3 

1909  16.3 

1910 9.6 

1911  6.1 

1912 24.1 

1913  1.7 

1914 15.1 

1915 21.9 

the  store  was  never  sold.  However,  talk  continued  about  sell- 
ing the  business,  sometimes  sparked  by  the  spotty  profits  and 
sometimes  by  the  general  dissatisfaction  with  management.14 
In  1909  there  was  some  talk  that  Charles  Ilfeld  was  seriously 
considering  the  purchase  of  the  Bond's  Encino  store  and  had 
said  he  would  do  so  if  he  could  get  a  satisfactory  man  to  run 
it.15  Nothing  ever  came  of  this,  however,  as  Ilfeld's  manager 
at  Willard  was  fully  aware  of  the  declining  number  of  sheep 
being  run  in  the  Willard-Palma-Encino  area. 

Late  in  1907  Richard  C.  Dillon  was  traveling  the  Estancia 
Valley  selling  merchandise  for  the  Gross-Kelly  Company.  A 
native  of  St.  Louis,  Dillon  had  come  to  New  Mexico  in  1889 
at  the  age  of  twelve.  He  was  employed  for  a  time  as  a  track 
man  on  the  Atlantic  and  Pacific  Railroad  in  Arizona  and 
subsequently  worked  a  few  years  as  a  clerk  in  the  Floersheim 
Mercantile  Company  at  Springer.16  He  went  with  the  Gross- 
Kelly  Company  in  Las  Vegas  in  1902,  working  in  the  hide 
and  wool  department,  and  was  later  transferred  to  Albu- 
querque as  a  traveling  salesman.17  He  worked  out  of  Albu- 
querque through  the  Rio  Grande  and  Estancia  valleys  and 
was  not  unknown  to  the  Bond  brothers  who  offered  him  a 
position  one  day  as  he  came  through  Encino.  Dillon  accepted 

14.  Letter  Book  No.  5S,  passim. 

16.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  January  1,  1910,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  eit. 

16.  Coan,  op.  cit.,  II,  15. 

17.  Davis,  op.  eit.,  I,  180. 


FRANK  BOND  339 

and  announced  his  resignation  from  the  Gross-Kelly  Com- 
pany by  simply  wiring  his  decision  from  Estancia;  Kelly's 
sharp  displeasure  was  expressed  in  strained  relations  be- 
tween them  for  many  years  afterwards.18 

Scheurich  left  on  January  1,  1908,  and  moved  to  Clovis 
where  he  established  a  mercantile  business  and  engaged  in 
insurance,  real  estate,  and  building  and  loan  activities.19  The 
precise  reason  for  Scheurich's  displacement  is  not  stated,  but 
there  is  no  evidence  to  indicate  that  he  had  been  expected  to 
extend  himself  beyond  mercantile  management,  so  as  George 
opened  up  the  area  for  sheep  and  wool  it  became  necessary 
to  have  a  man  of  wider  experience.20  Dillon  assumed  the  post 
of  general  manager  at  once,  although  the  corporate  minutes 
did  not  reflect  his  official  status  in  that  respect,  and  it  was 
not  until  February,  1916,  that  the  directors  officially  ap- 
pointed him  to  that  position.21 

The  generosity  of  the  Bond  brothers  and  the  vision  which 
they  displayed  in  the  development  of  promising  young  men 
had  a  far-reaching  and  lasting  impact  on  the  economic  and 
political  development  of  the  Territory  that  has  lasted  even 
until  the  present  time.  The  Bond  associates  not  only  have 
played  important  roles  in  the  economic  life  of  New  Mexico 
but  also  have  been  active  in  the  shaping  of  state  and  local 
affairs.22  Nearly  all  of  them  have  been  financially  successful, 
and  a  number  of  prominent  New  Mexico  families  can  trace 
their  economic  lineage  to  George  and  Frank  Bond.  The  em- 
ployment arrangement  with  Dillon,  both  generous  and  typi- 
cal, is  deserving  of  more  detailed  attention. 

It  was  originally  contemplated  that  the  capital  stock  of 

18.  Interview  with  R.  C.  Dillon,  Encino,  1956. 

19.  Davis,  op.  tit.,  II,  1951. 

20.  The  only  intimation  of  possible  dissatisfaction  with  Scheurich  is  contained  in 
G.  W.  Bond's  statement  to  Frank  that  "Dillon  is  now  here  and  in  charge  and  I  am  very 
much  pleased  with  the  change."  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  January  4,  1908, 
Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

21.  Record  of  Minutes,  loc.  cit. 

22.  Dillon  rose  to  become  a  state  senator  in  1925  and  was  later  elected  governor  of 
New  Mexico,  serving  from  1927  to  1931,  the  first  New  Mexico  governor  ever  to  succeed 
himself  in  office  (Davis,  ojt.  cit.,  I,  180).  Ed  Sargent  served  as  state  auditor,  was  elected 
a  county  commissioner  in  Rio  Arriba  County,  and  became  lieutenant  governor  of  New 
Mexico  in  1925    (Coan,  op.  cit.,  II,  5).  Walter  Connell  was  active  in  Albuquerque  city 
affairs  and  served  on  the  city  commission,  and  a  later  partner,  C.  G.  Gunderson,  was  a 
gubernatorial  candidate. 


340  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

the  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  Mercantile  Company  would  be  in- 
creased to  $45,000  and  that  Dillon  would  have  $15,000  of  it. 
Bond  estimated  that  Dillon  would  be  able,  under  a  one-third 
profit-sharing  agreement,  to  pay  out  his  stock  in  five  years 
and  that  he  might  even  accomplish  this  sooner  if  he  had  one 
or  two  good  sheep  and  wool  years.  George  Bond  considered 
that  Dillon  was  a  good  man  on  these  activities  outside  the 
store  and  counted  on  him  to  pursue  vigorously  all  phases  of 
the  business  to  achieve  this  end.23  However,  this  increase  in 
the  capital  of  the  company  did  not  develop  in  quite  that  way. 

Dillon  was  to  receive  a  salary  of  $125  per  month,24  and  in 
addition  he  was  to  receive  one-third  of  the  profits  from  the 
business.  It  was  agreed  that  all  profits  would  remain  un- 
divided until  the  business  was  sold  out  or  until  a  100  per  cent 
dividend  could  be  declared.  If  at  any  time  Dillon  wished  to 
buy  one-third  of  the  capital  stock  he  could  do  so  by  giving  a 
note  in  favor  of  G.  W.  Bond  and  Frank  Bond,  and  he  would 
then  receive  one-third  of  the  capital  stock  in  return.23  Interest 
on  the  note  would  be  paid  at  6  per  cent  and  annual  dividends 
of  6  per  cent  would  be  declared  so  that  Dillon  would  be  able 
to  pay  his  interest  on  the  note ;  all  other  profits  would  remain 
undivided  in  accordance  with  the  agreement.26 

If  Dillon  did  not  wish  to  take  one-third  of  the  stock  on  a 
personal  note  to  the  Bonds,  he  was  at  liberty  to  let  his  one- 
third  earnings  accrue  and  then  to  pay  cash  for  an  interest  in 
the  company  at  such  time  as  it  might  be  mutually  agreed  to 
declare  a  100  per  cent  dividend.27  It  was  not  until  1917  that 
Dillon  exercised  his  option  and  purchased  6,333  shares  of 
the  stock,  representing  a  25.3  per  cent  interest  in  the 
business.28 

This  arrangement  for  Dillon's  advent  into  the  Bond 
system  was  explained  by  George  Bond  who  wrote :  "Mr.  Dil- 

23.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  January  4,  1908,  Bond  Papers,  toe.  eit. 

24.  Interview  with  R.  C.  Dillon. 

25.  Presumably  the  stock  would  become  the  security  for  the  note.  Since  Dillon  never 
followed  through  on  this  exchange  of  a  note  for  stock,  the  point  is  not  recorded.  How- 
ever, this  was  the  usual  procedure. 

26.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  January  4,  1908,  Bond  Papers,  loe.  eit.; 
Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  July  25,  1911.  Bond  Papers,  toe.  eft. 

27.  Records,  toe.  eft. 

28.  Stock  Certificate  Book  (in  the  files  of  Frank  Bond  &  Son.,  Inc.,  Albuquerque). 


FRANK  BOND  341 

Ion  gets  his  interest  in  this  business  by  virtue  of  being  the 
manager  and  has  full  control  of  the  business  in  every  way."29 

Sales  figures  for  the  first  year  of  the  Dillon  era  are  not 
available,  but  in  the  following  year,  1909,  they  amounted  to 
a  staggering  $93,000  and  represented  a  turnover  of  almost 
five  times  on  merchandise.30  George  Bond,  however,  was 
pretty  well  convinced  by  this  time  that  1909  was  a  high  year 
and  that  the  Encino  business  could  not  make  more  than  $2,500 
a  year  over  and  above  expenses  and  interest  on  investment.31 
However,  as  previously  noted,  earnings  actually  went  con- 
siderably over  this  figure,  and  in  1915  they  sold  almost  $82,- 
000  in  merchandise  to  customers.32 

Cash  balances  carried  by  the  mercantile  company  were 
heavier  than  would  have  been  thought  necessary,  and  they 
are  noteworthy  in  that  such  large  cash  reserves  were  not 
typical  of  the  policies  of  the  Bonds  as  exercised  in  their  other 
areas  of  interest.  Balances  at  the  end  of  1912, 1913, 1914,  and 
1915  were  generally  in  the  neighborhood  of  $12,000  to  $18,- 
000,  most  of  it  being  carried  in  the  First  National  Bank  of 
Santa  Fe.33 

A  characteristic  of  the  Encino  store  that  was  reflected 
continuously  throughout  the  period  from  its  founding 
through  1915  was  the  large  size  of  the  book  receivables.  In 
seven  years  out  of  the  ten,  accounts  receivable  exceeded  the 
inventory  of  merchandise.34  In  1914  they  amounted  to  $28,- 
270.76  and  represented  accounts  with  131  customers  ranging 
in  size  from  $.25  to  $4,176.60.35  A  comparison  of  the  receiv- 
ables and  year-end  inventory  is  shown  in  Table  53. 

In  spite  of  the  relatively  high  level  of  receivables,  losses 
were  not  as  great  as  might  be  expected.  They  were  usually 
valued  at  90  per  cent,  but  in  1915,  the  only  year  for  which 
specific  write-off  information  is  available,  only  $419.48  were 

29.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

30.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  January  1,  1910,  Bond  Papers,  loc.  cit. 

31.  Ibid. 

32.  Records,  loc.  cit. 

33.  Ibid. 

34.  Ibid. 

35.  Accounts  payable  amounted  to  $4,444.75  in  that  year  and  represented  cash  de- 
posits from  twenty-six  customers,  there  being  nothing  at  all  due  to  wholesale  suppliers. 
Ibid. 


342  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

written  off,  against  almost  $26,000  in  receivables.36  However 
the  necessity  of  carrying  the  accounts  gave  Frank  Bond 
pause,  and  in  1914  he  wrote:  "I  don't  believe  in  putting  all 
our  profits  year  after  year  in  accounts  and  rented  sheep. 
There  is  a  happy  limit  to  all  these  things."37 

TABLE  53 

G.  W.  BOND  &  BRO.  MERCANTILE  COMPANY 

ACCOUNTS  RECEIVABLE  AND  MERCHANDISE  INVENTORY 

(dollars  in  thousands) 

Year  Accounts  Merchandise 

Receivable  Inventory 

1906  $19.6  $20.4 

1907  26.1  24.0 

1908  18.6  16.1 

1909  18.6  20.3 

1910  13.9  18.2 

1911  18.0  17.0 

1912  22.0  17.0 

1913  21.6  18.1 

1914  28.3  18.3 

1915  25.8  22.4 

At  the  end  of  1910  G.  W.  Bond  brought  Clarence  E. 
Davenport  down  to  Encino  from  Trinidad,  Colorado,  where 
he  had  operated  the  Forbes  Wool  Company  scouring  mill 
since  about  1903.  The  exact  role  that  Davenport  was  to  play 
is  not  clear  on  the  record  now.  That  it  must  have  been  a  diffi- 
cult one  is  implicit  in  the  fact  that  he  was  to  be  paid  by  G.  W. 
Bond  personally  rather  than  by  the  company.  His  agreement 
with  the  elder  Bond  provided  that  he  would  receive  $300  per 
year  plus  a  one-half  interest  in  all  the  undivided  profits  which 
accrued  personally  to  G.  W.  Bond  after  December  31,  1910.38 
Davenport  was  an  old  and  trusted  employee  of  the  Bonds  and 
knew  a  great  deal  about  the  sheep  and  wool  business,  but  just 
why  G.  W.  Bond  felt  it  necessary  to  make  this  arrangement 
is  somewhat  of  a  mystery.  The  Bonds  had  a  great  deal  of 
confidence  in  Dillon  at  that  time,  and  in  1910  the  sheep  busi- 

36.  Ibid. 

37.  Letter  Book  No.  53,  June  30,  1914,  p.  171. 

38.  Records,  loc.  cit. 


FRANK  BOND  343 

ness  had  turned  upward  from  its  slump  in  the  previous  year. 
No  friction  between  George  Bond  and  R.  C.  Dillon  is  known 
to  have  existed  as  early  as  1910,  and  it  is  quite  possible  that 
the  difficulty  which  developed  later  was  keyed  to  Davenport's 
arrival  with  an  important  financial  tie  to  the  elder  stock- 
holder. At  any  rate,  the  relationship  between  Dillon  and 
Davenport  must  have  at  least  been  taut,  and  it  is  observed 
that  when  Dillon  bought  his  6,333  shares  of  stock  in  January 
of  1917,  Davenport  also  acquired  4,000  shares  which  he  held 
until  1921  when  his  holdings  were  reduced  to  one  share.39 
Serious  strife  in  the  organization  first  became  apparent 
early  in  1914.  By  July  of  that  year  trouble  between  George 
Bond  and  Dillon  had  reached  the  point  where  Frank  Bond,  in 
an  effort  to  mitigate  the  misunderstanding,  suggested  that 
George  Bond  and  Dillon  have  a  face-to-face  talk.40  The  ques- 
tion of  selling  the  business  arose  in  this  connection,  and  it  is 
difficult  to  tell  whether  the  friction  between  the  elder  Bond 
and  the  Encino  manager  was  the  cause  or  the  effect  of  the 
former's  desire  to  "pull  out"  of  Encino.  Nor  was  everything 
always  perfectly  smooth  between  Dillon  and  Frank  Bond.  In 
June,  Bond  offered  Dillon  $3.50  for  his  ewes  and  the  latter 
agreed  by  wire  to  sell  at  that  price.  After  Bond  had  com- 
mitted himself  to  dispose  of  the  sheep,  Dillon  jumped  the 
price  to  $3.75  and  thus  placed  Frank  Bond  in  a  most  embar- 
rassing position.  He  was  chagrined,  of  course,  but  felt  that 
Andy  Wiest  had  forced  Dillon  to  do  it.41  In  spite  of  such  an- 
noyances Frank  wrote  his  brother  only  a  month  after  the 
above  incident  in  words  that  convey  no  trace  of  rancor  but 
rather  express  confidence  and  trust : 

[Dillon]  is  just  as  good  a  man  now  as  he  was  any  time  since 
he  joined  us,  so  if  he  wants  to  stay  on  why  should  he  not  do  as 
well  as  he  has  done?  I  am  certainly  willing  to  risk  my  money 
with  him,  if  he  wants  to  stay  on.42 

George  Bond  was  very  much  in  favor  of  selling  out  at 
Encino,  and  Frank  Bond  wrote :  "I  am  in  favor  of  selling  the 

39.  Stock  Certificate  Book,  loc.  cit. 

40.  Letter  Book  No.  53,  July  6,  1914,  p.  266  ;  ibid.,  July  10,  1914,  p.  320. 

41.  Ibid.,  June  19,  1914,  p.  58. 

42.  Letter  Book  No.  53,  July  1,  1914,  p.  217. 


344  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Encino  store.  It  is  too  uncertain,  somewhat  like  dry  farm- 
ing."43 However,  the  matter  was  left  largely  up  to  Dillon  who 
indicated  that  he  wanted  to  keep  the  Encino  store  going. 
Although  Frank  had  written  on  June  30  that  he  was  in  favor 
of  selling  out,  by  July  10  he  had  decided  that  he  did  not  want 
to  sell,  and  just  a  week  later  he  even  suggested  that  it  would 
please  Dillon  to  change  the  name  of  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  Mer- 
cantile Company  to  the  Bond-Dillon  Mercantile  Company.44 
However,  nothing  ever  came  of  this  suggestion  directly,45  and 
the  Encino  firm  never  changed  its  name. 

Since  Frank  and  George  were  equal  partners  in  both  the 
Encino  and  Espanola  stores,  it  had  made  little  difference 
during  the  early  years  of  the  business  whether  the  sheep  and 
wool  at  Encino  were  on  the  Espanola  or  Encino  books.  There- 
fore, all  the  sheep  and  wool  that  were  handled  at  Encino 
before  1908  were  carried  on  the  G.  W.  Bond  &  Bro.  books  at 
Espanola.  Dillon  was  felt  to  be  "alright  on  both  of  these  out- 
side items,"46  and  so  after  George  returned  to  Trinidad  and 
Dillon  took  over,  the  sheep  and  wool  accounts  were  carried  on 
the  Encino  books. 

The  investment  in  sheep  after  it  was  transferred  from 
Espanola  to  Encino  is  presented  in  Table  54,  and  the  balances 
reflect  a  reversal  of  the  trend  expected  in  1909  when  it  was 
generally  considered  that  the  sheep  business  in  that  area 
would  decline  sharply.47  In  1915  the  gross  profit  from  sheep 
amounted  to  $10,500  and  represented  almost  one-third  of  the 
$35,000  gross  profit  on  operations  for  that  year.48 

During  the  period  under  examination,  sheep  feeding  oper- 
ations were  not  carried  on  to  any  extent  by  the  Encino  store, 
and  the  accounts  for  1914  and  1915  reflected  a  balance  in  the 
sheep  feeding  account  of  less  than  $30.  Feeding  activities 
were  discussed,  however,  late  in  1914.49  The  Encino  store  did 
have  an  interest  in  the  Scott  and  Russell  feeding  accounts  in 

43.  Ibid.,  June  30,  1914,  p.  171. 

44.  Ibid.,  July  2,  1914,  p.  219 ;  ibid.,  July  10,  1914,  p.  820 ;  ibid.,  July  17,  1914,  p.  382. 

45.  A  Bond-Dillon  Company  was  organized  in  Albuquerque  some  years  later,  but  it 
was  separate  from  the  Encino  business. 

46.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  January  4,  1908,  Bond  Papers,  tee.  ctt. 

47.  Letter  of  G.  W.  Bond  to  Frank  Bond,  January  1,  1910,  Bond  Papers,  tec.  ctt. 

48.  Records,  tee.  ctt. 

49.  Letter  Book  No.  55,  October  14,  1914,  p.  486. 


FRANK  BOND  345 

the  winter  of  1914-1915  ;50  the  former  producing  a  profit  in 
the  spring  of  1915  amounting  to  $1,910.30,51  and  the  latter 
showing  a  profit  of  $1,164.63,52  or  a  total  of  $3,074.76  from 
the  two  sheep  feeding  accounts.  The  company  showed  a 
profit  on  feeding  operations  for  that  year  of  $2,604.65,  or 
$470.11  less  than  the  total  gross  amount  realized,  so  this  may 
have  been  the  Encino  store's  investment  in  the  feeding  ac- 
count for  that  year.53 

TABLE  54 

G.  W.  BOND  &  BRO.  MERCANTILE  COMPANY  SHEEP 

INVESTMENT 
(dollars  in  thousands) 

Year  Amount  Sheep » 

1908  $11.4 

1909  .0  1,434  * 

1910  15.8 

1911  14.6  7,596 

1912  28.8 

1913  26.6 

1914  34.2  12,861  c 

1915  41.6  14,392' 

•  Data  not  available  for  years  not  shown. 

b  Sheep  on  hand,  but  not  picked  up  in  inventory. 

0  On  rent. 

The  only  untoward  event  that  transpired  at  Encino  was 
a  fire  in  1914.  In  June  of  that  year  Frank  Bond  wrote  to 
Dillon  expressing  his  regrets  and  advising  him  to  carry  full 
insurance.  However,  the  matter  was  never  mentioned  again 
nor  is  there  any  evidence  of  a  fire  loss  on  the  financial  state- 
ments. It  was  therefore  in  all  probability  a  minor  fire,  and 
due  to  the  fact  that  it  happened  just  shortly  after  the  major 
fire  of  1914  in  Espanola,  the  concern  that  it  might  otherwise 
have  caused  was  all  but  lost  in  the  larger  misfortune.54 


50.  Letter  Book  No.  56,  December  5,  1914,  p.  228. 
61.  Letter  Book  No.  58,  June  1,  1915,  p.  358. 

52.  Letter  Book  No.  57,  April  23,  1915,  p.  630. 

53.  Records,  loc.  tit. 

54.  Letter  Book  No.  5S,  June  23,  1914,  p.  99. 


Notes  and  Documents 

THE  EURINDIAN  :  A  SUBJECT  FOR  SOUTHWESTERN  STUDIES 

By  Jack  D.  Forbes 


Most  studies  dealing  with  the  Southwestern  region  have  condsidered 
two  major  ethnic  types,  the  Caucasian  (Spanish  or  Anglo-American) 
and  the  Indian.  It  is  my  opinion,  however,  that  a  third  type  can  be  dis- 
tinguished and  profitably  dealt  with  by  the  historian,  anthropologist  and 
sociologist.  I  have  reference  to  the  eurindian,  i.e.,  persons  of  mixed 
Indian-caucasion  ancestry. 

Eurindians  have  been  very  important  in  the  history  of  the  South- 
west, as  in  other  areas  of  the  Americas,  and  it  would  seem  worthwhile 
for  scholars  to  undertake  studies  dealing  with  this  hybrid  ethnic  group. 
Much  of  the  post-conquest  history  of  New  Mexico  and  California,  for 
example,  revolves  around  the  activities  of  the  eurindian,  rather  than 
either  Caucasians  or  Indians.  To  be  specific,  relatively  few  Caucasian 
Spanish  subjects  ever  went  to  the  northern  frontier  of  New  Spain.  The 
vast  majority  of  Spanish-speaking  settlers  and  soldiers  in  this  area 
were  non-caucasians,  i.e.,  eurindians,  Indians,  afro-urindians  eurafri- 
cans  (negro-caucasian  hybrids)  or  negroes,  with  the  eurindian  gradu- 
ally predominating.  Furthermore,  the  virtual  absence  of  Caucasian 
women  on  the  frontier  meant  that  those  Caucasian  men  who  settled  in 
the  area  produced  eurindian  progeny.  Thus  in  New  Mexico  the  His- 
panic population  became  largely  eurindian  with  only  the  upper  military 
officials  and  the  clergy  being  of  pure  Caucasian  stock.  Still  further, 
many  of  the  indigenous  groups  of  the  region  became  partially  eurindian 
with  the  acquisition  of  Caucasian  genes  due  to  miscegenation  and  the 
adoption  of  captured  Hispano-eurindians  (as  with  the  Apache  especi- 
ally). 

The  eurindian  was  especially  important  in  pre-1848  California  be- 
cause over  ten  times  as  many  men  as  women  migrated  from  Mexico  to 
that  area,  and  the  majority  of  these  migrants  were  apparently  non- 
caucasian  to  begin  with.  In  California  the  Spanish-speaking  population 
(gente  de  razo)  increased  rapidly  due  to  miscegenation  with  California 
Indian  women.  Thus  the  Hispanic  population  of  the  area  became  in- 
creasingly eurindian  (and  Indian),  with  possibly  only  the  upper  strata 
being  Caucasian.  During  the  Mexican  period  (1822-1847)  many  or  most 
of  the  governors  and  provincial  leaders  were  eurindians  of  one  shade 
or  another. 

Thus  when  one  speaks  of  the  Hispano-Mexican  era  in  the  Southwest 
one  is  speaking  of  a  period  initially  led  by  Caucasians  but  in  which  the 
eurindian  always  was  a  essential  element.  By  the  Mexican  period  lighter- 
skinned  eurindians  had  definitely  achieved  a  position  of  leadership. 

346 


NOTES   AND  DOCUMENTS  347 

Since  1848  the  eurindian  has  continued  in  importance  as  witnessed 
by  the  following  items :  (1 )  Many  of  the  fur  trappers,  traders  and  guides 
who  opened  up  the  Southwest  were  eurindians.  Examples,  are  Jean  B. 
Charbonneau,  Pauline  Weaver,  Antoine  Leroux,  and  Jose  Jessum.  (2) 
The  indigenous  tribes  of  the  region  have  become  increasingly  eurindian. 
Thus  a  majority  of  the  California  Indians  are  actually  eurindian  today. 
(3)  Many  eurindians  have  been  at  least  partially  absorbed  into  the 
Caucasian  community,  with  a  resultant  dispersal  of  Indian  genes.  (4) 
There  are  several  millions  of  Mexican-Americans  in  the  area  and  they 
are  largely  eurindian.  It  would  seem  that  this  group  can  best  be  under- 
stood in  terms  of  their  racially  hybrid  character. 

It  should  be  clear  that  the  eurindian  forms  an  important  ethnic  type 
in  the  Southwest  and  is  worthy  of  investigation.  Undoubtedly  many 
problems  can  be  defined  which,  upon  solution,  will  shed  much  light 
upon  the  effects,  culturally,  historically,  and  genetically,  of  hybridiza- 
tion. Likewise,  significant  eurindian-Indian  and  eurindian-caucasian 
contact  studies  can  be  made.  It  is  hoped  that  this  brief  article  will  help 
to  stimulate  interest  in  the  subject. 

San  Fernando  Sate  College  JACK  D.  FORBES 

KILLED  BY  THE  KID 

The  killing  of  F.  P.  Cahill  is  the  first  authenticated  mur- 
der attributable  to  Billy  the  Kid.  It  is,  of  course,  possible  that 
Cahill  had  been  preceded  by  the  Chinese  gambler  allegedly 
shot  at  Globe,  but  at  the  very  best  the  story  of  the  latter's 
demise  comes  to  us  secondhand,1  and  so  far  no  one  has  pre- 
sented any  contemporary  evidence  to  substantiate  its  right 
to  be  accepted  as  anything  but  folklore.  Regardless  of 
whether  Cahill  was  number  one  or  number  two  on  the  Kid's 
list,  has  an  unimpeachable  claim  on  our  interest:  he  was 
the  only  one  of  Billy's  victims  who  left  behind  him  his  version 
of  the  fatal  meeting. 

Cahill,  who  appears  to  have  been  a  blacksmith  familiarly 
known  as  "Windy,"  was  mortally  wounded  in  George  Adkin's 
saloon  at  Camp  Grant,  Arizona,  on  August  17,  1877.  The  ar- 
ticle in  which  the  Tucson  Arizona  Citizen  reported  the  affair 
was  disinterred  some  years  ago.2  Very  recently,  however,  the 
writer  was  browsing  through  some  microfilm  copies  of  the 

1.  Rasch,  Philip  J.,  The  Twenty-One  Men  He  Put  Bullets  Through.  New  Mexico  Folk- 
lore Record,  IX  :8-14,  1955. 

2.  Rasch,  Philip  J.  and  R.  N.  Mullin,  Dim  Trails :  The  Pursuit  of  the  McCarty  Family. 
New  Mexico  Folklore  Record,  VIII  :6-ll,  1954. 


348  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

Tucson  Arizona  Weekly  Star.  To  his  pleased  surprise  his  eye 
suddenly  lit  on  an  item  which  contained  Cahill's  death  bed 
account  of  the  encounter.  The  article  is  reproduced  in  full 
below. 

Frank  P.  Cahill  was  shot  by  Henry  Antrem  alias  Kid,  at 
Camp  Grant  on  the  17th,  and  died  on  the  18th.  The  following 
are  the  dying  words  of  the  deceased : 

I,  Frank  P.  Cahill,  being  convinced  that  I  am  about  to  die, 
do  make  the  following  as  my  final  statement:  My  name  is 
Frank  P.  Cahill ;  I  was  born  in  the  county  and  town  of  Galway, 
Ireland:  yesterday,  Aug.  17th  1877,  I  had  some  trouble  with 
Henry  Antrem,  otherwise  known  as  Kid,  during  which  he  shot 

me.  I  had  called  him  a  pimp,  and  he  called  me  a  s of  a 

b ;  we  then  took  hold  of  each  other;  I  did  not  hit  him,  I 

think ;  saw  him  go  for  his  pistol,  and  tried  to  get  hold  of  it,  but 
could  not  and  he  shot  me  in  the  belly;  I  have  a  sister  named 
Margaret  Flannigan  living  at  East  Cambridge,  Miss.,  and  an- 
other named  Kate  Conden,  living  in  San  Francisco.3 

PHILIP  J.  RASCH 

U.  S.  Indian  School 
Thoreau,  New  Mex. 
December  14,  1953 

Mr.  R.  C.  Pettingell,  Ed. 

Sun  Trails, 

Albuquerque,  N.  M. 

Dear  Mr.  Pettingell : 

Enclosed  are  the  spot,  the  write  up,  and  the  photo  that  I  promised 
you.  Will  you  please  return  the  photo  after  you  have  finished  with  it? 

Well  Christmas  is  almost  here.  I  have  two  little  girls  and  they  are 
very  anxious.  I  haven't  worked  since  my  operation  &  sometimes  the 
sledding  is  pretty  rough.  I  wonder  if  you  couldn't  make  an  exception  and 
pay  me  for  the  rest  of  this  job?  I  would  like  to  get  a  few  presents  for 
the  girls  and  my  wife.  She  keeps  us  in  groceries  but  there's  never  any 
thing  extra  &  I  thought  that  at  Christmas  we  ought  to  have  a  little 
extra.  I  know  of  no  one  I  can  ask  except  you  and  I  hope  you  can  do  this 
for  me.  Let  me  hear  from  you,  I  am, 

Sincerely, 

Paul  F.  E.  Goodbear 

P.S.  Magazine  called  "Real"  has  article  entitled,  "The  Fighting 
Cheyennes."  Got  my  copy  at  cigar  store  south  of  Hilton  Hotel.  Article 
seems  to  be  pretty  accurate. 

8.  Tucson  Arizona  Weekly  Star,  August  23,  1877. 


NOTES   AND  DOCUMENTS  349 

A  POINT  OF  VIEW 

"En  venticino  de  Diciembre  de  mil  ochocientos  cuarenta  y  dos  en  el 
camposanto  de  esta  Parroquia  de  la  Villa  de  Mier.  Yo  El  Presbitero 
Don.  Jose  Luis  Gonzaga  Garcia  Cure.  [Cura  Interino]  Interino  de  dicha 
Villa.  Di  sepultura  Eclesiastica  en  restura  [?  indistinct]  menor  al 
cuerpo  de  Don  Jacinto  Carrillo  adulto  no  he  [?  se]  confeso  por  haber 
estado  ausente  el  Padre  por  la  guerra  de  los  godames  americanos,  fue 
casado  con  Dona  Carmen  .  .  .  ."  Church  of  La  Purisima  Concepcion  de 
Ciudad  Mier,  Tamaulipas,  Mexico. 


Book  Reviews 

Kirby  Benedict,  Frontier  Federal  Judge.  By  Aurora  Hunt. 
Glendale,  Calif. :  Arthur  H.  Clark  Company.  Illustrations, 
map,  index,  bibliography,  $9.00. 

In  1951,  Miss  Aurora  Hunt,  of  Whittier,  Cal.,  a  diligent 
researcher  and  capable  writer,  wrote  The  Army  of  the  Pa- 
cific, detailing  its  operations  in  California,  Arizona  and  New 
Mexico,  during  the  years  1860  and  1866.  In  1958  Miss  Hunt 
wrote  Major  General  James  H.  Carleton,  likewise  an  impor- 
tant contribution  to  Southwestern  history.  As  a  companion 
piece  to  The  Army  and  the  Pacific,  and  Carleton,  Miss  Hunt 
has  now  written  Kirby  Benedict,  Frontier  Federal  Judge.  For 
many  years  Judge  Benedict  has  been  a  shadowy  figure  of 
Territorial  days  in  New  Mexico,  remembered  principally  be- 
cause of  the  famous  sentence  he  is  reputed  to  have  imposed 
upon  unfortunate  Jose  Maria  Martin,  a  convicted  murderer. 

Born  in  Connecticut  in  1810,  according  to  Miss  Hunt's 
book,  Benedict  was  appointed  an  Associate  Justice  of  the 
Territorial  Court  of  New  Mexico  by  President  Pierce  in  1853. 
Benedict  traveled  as  a  young  man  from  New  England 
through  Ohio  to  Mississippi,  where  he  studied  law  and  was 
admitted  to  the  bar.  He  retraced  his  steps  to  Illinois,  in  which 
state  he  became  a  member  of  the  legislature,  and  rode  circuit 
with  Abraham  Lincoln.  Benedict  traveled  in  New  Mexico 
at  times  with  W.  W.  H.  Davis,  United  States  Attorney  in  the 
fifties,  who  wrote  El  Gringo  and  Spanish  Conquest  of  New 
Mexico,  two  important  books  about  Territorial  days. 

Chief  Justice  of  the  Supreme  Court  in  New  Mexico  dur- 
ing the  Civil  War  years,  Benedict  had  ample  opportunity  to 
know  and  observe  military  and  political  situations  at  first 
hand.  He  kept  a  journal  and  wrote  articles  for  newspapers 
occasionally,  sometimes  using  a  non  de  plume.  He  was  a  pro- 
lific letter  writer.  He  freely  communicated  his  thoughts  by 
means  of  the  spoken  word  to  friend  and  foe,  which  at  times 
got  him  into  trouble.  In  his  latter  years  Kirby  Benedict  ap- 

350 


BOOK  REVIEWS  351 

parently  failed  to  develop  an  immunity  to  the  after  effects  of 
excessive  consumption  of  alcoholic  beverages.  As  a  result,  he 
became  involved  in  needless  quarrels  with  bench  and  bar.  He 
died  in  Santa  Fe  on  Feb.  27,  1874. 

The  twenty  years  Kirby  Benedict  spent  in  New  Mexico, 
as  judge,  lawyer  and  newspaper  editor,  spanned  a  most  inter- 
esting era  in  New  Mexico's  history.  After  Abraham  Lincoln's 
election  to  the  Presidency,  Kirby  Benedict  seemingly  relied 
heavily  on  his  acquaintance  and  friendship  with  him.  Re- 
peated claims  of  influence,  and  continual  boasting  of  friend- 
ship with  the  President,  contributed  substantially  toward 
Benedict's  eventual  downfall.  Kirby  Benedict's  portrait  for 
all  New  Mexicans  to  see  has  now  been  well  painted  by  Miss 
Hunt.  From  now  on  out  there  will  be  no  need  to  speculate 
about  Kirby  Benedict.  Making  good  use  of  Benedict's  ma- 
terials and  of  official  papers  and  documents  in  Santa  Fe  and 
Washington,  Miss  Hunt  has  been  successful  in  writing  a  most 
interesting  and  valuable  book  on  colorful  early  days  in  New 
Mexico.  Miss  Hunt  has  written  down  everything  that  it  is 
necessary  to  know  about  him  in  order  to  form  an  appropriate 
opinion  about  his  life  and  times  in  New  Mexico. 

Albuquerque  WILLIAM  A.  KELEHER 

Nebraska  Place-Names.  By  Lilian  L.  Fitzpatrick.  Including 
selections  from  J.  T.  Link's  Origin  of  the  Place-Names  of 
Nebraska.  Edited  with  introduction  by  G.  Thomas  Fair- 
clough.  Lincoln:  University  of  Nebraska  Press,  1960. 
Pp.  227.  $1.50. 

Isaac  Taylor,  that  indefatigable,  though  often  pedantic, 
English  philologist  wrote  in  his  now  classic,  Words  and 
Places  (1865,  p.  1) 

Local  names — whether  they  belong  to  provinces,  cities,  and 
villages,  or  are  the  designations  of  rivers  and  mountains — are 
never  mere  arbitrary  sounds,  devoid  of  meaning.  They  may 
always  be  regarded  as  records  of  the  past,  inviting  and  re- 
warding a  careful  historical  interpretation. 


352  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

The  volume  being  reviewed  is  sufficient  proof  of  the  ac- 
curacy of  Mr.  Taylor's  statement.  Nebraska  Place-Names 
originally  appeared  in  1925  in  the  University  of  Nebraska 
serial  Studies  in  Language,  Literature  and  Criticism.  In  addi- 
tion to  Miss  Fitzpatrick's  work,  the  editor  decided  to  include 
a  fifty-seven  page  essay  by  John  T.  Link,  The  Origin  of  the 
Place-Names  of  Nebraska,  which  was  first  published  in  1933 
as  a  Bulletin  of  the  Nebraska  Geological  Survey. 

The  editor,  in  his  introduction,  has  gently  suggested  that 
an  obvious  motivation  for  the  present  edition  was  to  offer 
the  works  to  a  larger  audience  than  was  reached  by  the  first 
publication.  A  point  well  taken  as  we  are  all  familiar  with  a 
number  of  valuable  (though  oft  times  esoteric)  works  which 
are  buried  in  a  University  publication  series,  out  of  sight, 
out  of  mind. 

Miss  Fitzpatrick  limited  her  study  to  the  names  of  Ne- 
braska communities.  Her  material  is  organized  in  a  gazetteer 
fashion  alphabetically  by  counties  and  then  by  towns  within 
the  counties.  Brief  annotation  is  provided  for  each  town,  the 
whole  followed  by  an  index  which  serves  as  an  adequate 
cross-reference.  In  the  sum,  the  organization  is  direct  and 
easily  accessible  for  the  researcher. 

Most  Nebraska  community  names  were  derived  from 
five  sources :  personal  names,  from  nearby  geographical  fea- 
tures, from  names  transferred  from  foreign  origin,  Indian 
names  and  those  of  "coined"  origin.  An  intriguing,  though 
understandable,  fact  was  that  of  the  more  than  two  hundred 
names  of  personal  derivation  over  seventy  were  those  of  the 
"first"  postmaster,  with  town  founders  and  railroad  officials 
respectively  a  poor  second  and  third  choice. 

Many  students  have  and  will  find  Miss  Fitzpatrick's  com- 
pilation useful.  We  can  only  regret  that  she  restricted  her 
subject  to  communities  instead  of  also  including  geographical 
features.  In  addition,  it  would  have  been  helpful  for  non- 
Nebraskans  if  the  author  had  included  a  pronunciation  guide. 

John  T.  Link's  essay  differs  in  scope,  interest  and  organi- 
zation from  Miss  Fitzpatrick's  work.  Mr.  Link  was  con- 
cerned with  the  origin  of  geographical  place-names.  How- 


BOOK  REVIEWS  353 

ever,  in  spite  of  the  more  ample  annotation,  the  erratic  selec- 
tion plus  the  absence  of  an  index  will  thwart  all  but  the  most 
persevering  of  users. 

It  has  been  eighteen  years  since  George  R.  Stewart  first 
offered  a  preliminary  plan  for  a  place-name  study  for  the 
entire  United  States,  on  a  state  by  state  basis.  In  the  age 
of  governmental  largesse  and  foundation  grants,  which  have 
in  recent  years  provided  funds  for  so  many  "pilot"  projects, 
perhaps  it  is  not  Utopian  to  anticipate  the  eventual  fruition 
of  Stewart's  survey.  Until  we  do  have  such  a  study,  the  pub- 
lishers of  Nebraska  are  to  be  commended  for  making  the 
present  work  available. 

Finally,  the  University  of  Nebraska  Press  deserves  com- 
mendation for  the  inauguration  of  the  Bison  Book  series. 
With  the  current  boom  in  Western  Americana,  the  future 
will  bode  well  for  paperback  editions  of  this  quality  and 
selectivity. 

Archivist,  University  of  Wyoming  GENE  M.  GRESSLEY 

Saints  in  the  Valleys.  By  Jose  E.  Espinosa,  with  a  Foreword 
by  Fray  Angelico  Chavez.  The  University  of  New  Mexico 
Press,  1960.  Bibliography.  $6.50. 

This  work,  made  possible  by  a  grant  from  the  Ford 
Foundation,  is  not  only  a  study  of  the  work  of  the  native 
New  Mexico  painters  and  sculptors  of  sacred  images  during 
the  18th  and  19th  centuries  (circa  1795  to  1860) .  It  embodies, 
likewise,  a  history  of  New  Mexico  told  from  the  point  of  view 
of  the  author  in  his  search  for  records  of  the  importation  and 
manufacture  of  such  images. 

The  recognition  that  folk  art  is  a  rich  contribution  to  the 
civilization  of  the  world,  having  a  strong  appeal  even  to  the 
most  sophisticated  lover  of  art,  has,  in  recent  years,  stimu- 
lated a  wide  interest  in  primitive  American  art  forms.  These 
range  across  the  whole  field  of  human  living  on  this  continent 
and  along  the  entire  route  of  our  history  as  colonies  of  Euro- 
pean powers  and  as  a  nation. 


354  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

The  objects  which  constitute  the  vast  treasury  of  this  art 
are  found  in  museums,  in  second  hand  stores,  in  the  posses- 
sion of  collectors  and  even  in  the  stores,  churches  and  public 
and  private  dwellings  which  were  their  natural  habitat.  They 
embrace  such  diverse  things  as  the  signs,  helmets,  buckets 
and  engines  of  the  volunteer  firemen,  the  colonial  doorways 
of  New  England,  and  the  ingenious  tools  of  a  century  or  more 
ago.  Newcomers  in  the  field  (insofar  as  the  attention  of  the 
world  of  art  is  concerned)  are  the  santos,  or  images  of  the 
saints,  painted  on  wooden  panels  (the  retablos)  or  carved 
into  statues  of  wood  (the  bultos)  of  the  Spanish  Southwest. 

The  author  of  this  volume  at  page  xii  of  the  Preface 
seems  to  state  that  their  grace  and  elegance  can  only  be 
sensed  by  "those  who  share,  even  in  part,  the  faith  of  those 
who  made  them."  And  the  author  of  the  Foreword  refers, 
patronizingly  it  seemed  to  me,  to  scholars  like  E.  Boyd,  the 
undoubted  leader  in  their  study,  and  even  suggests  that  they 
do  not  have  the  qualifications  of  Dr.  Espinosa  because  they 
are  not  Catholics.  However  that  may  be,  the  santos  have,  in 
fact,  become  the  property  of  the  artistic  world.  Like  the 
religious  paintings  of  Raphael  and  the  great  carved  figures 
of  the  Buddhist  sculptors  they  represent  more,  even,  than  the 
expression  of  a  particular  religion  and  have  become  manifes- 
tations of  the  striving  of  the  human  spirit  toward  beauty, 
truth,  goodness  and  God. 

There  are  few  works  of  real  scholarly  value  dealing  with 
the  santos  and  this  is  one  of  them.  In  the  first  35  pages  the 
author  has  listed,  in  the  course  of  a  summary  of  New  Mexi- 
can history,  numerous  references  to  the  santos  by  observers, 
historians  and  others.  This  portion  is  followed  by  a  number 
of  plates,  identified,  where  possible,  as  the  work  of  known 
makers.  Chapter  5  deals  with  the  classification  and  tech- 
nology of  the  santos.  Chapter  6  deals  with  the  retablo  paint- 
ers and  lists  the  twelve  retablo  painters  who  have  been  iden- 
tified. Unfortunately,  none  of  the  published  works  on  the 
santos  contain  enough  plates  to  give  the  reader  much  help 
in  making  his  own  comparisons  and  identifying  them  him- 
self, and  this  is  no  exception.  A  comprehensive  exhibition  of 
santos,  identified  works  of  the  various  santeros  being 


BOOK  REVIEWS  355 

grouped  together,  would  be  a  real  contribution  to  understand- 
ing of  the  subject.  Chapter  7  on  the  bulto  carvers  is  the  first 
separate  study  of  this  subject  which  I  have  encountered  and 
hence  was  of  special  interest  to  me.  Chapter  8  deals  with  the 
part  played  by  the  santos  in  New  Mexican  life  and  is  one 
of  the  most  interesting.  There  are  eight  appendices,  some 
of  considerable  interest.  Appendix  A  (perhaps  the  most  val- 
uable) deals  with  Christian  iconography  and  contributes 
definitions  of  symbols  (referring  to  abstract  qualities  of  the 
saint,  such  as  learning,  piety,  purity,  etc.),  attributes  (ob- 
jects shown  with  the  figure  or  painting  and  related  to  per- 
sonal history  or  legend),  emblems  (similar  objects  which, 
standing  by  themselves,  are  symbols  of  the  saint,  but  repre- 
senting the  concrete  rather  than  the  abstract),  and  types 
(objects  associated  with  Christian  doctrines) .  An  extensive 
bibliography  and  an  index  conclude  the  volume. 

University  of  New  Mexico  J.  D.  ROBB 


The  Southwest:  Old  and  New.  By  W.  Eugene  Hollon.  New 
York :  Alfred  A.  Knopf,  1961.  Pp.  xvii,  487.  Maps,  bibliog- 
raphy, illustrations,  index. 

Professor  Hollon's  history  is  the  first  general  survey  of 
Oklahoma,  Texas,  New  Mexico  and  Arizona.  Barring  some 
weaknesses  noted  later,  the  study  is  well  and  interestingly 
written,  and  generally  accurate.  The  book  falls  into  three 
parts,  preceded  by  an  outline  of  Southwestern  geography, 
whose  area  should  read  570,000  square  miles,  p.  21.  With  his 
choices  of  regions  some  would  quarrel,  but  Hollon  readily 
admits  disagreement. 

The  first  part  of  the  volume  surveys  the  pre-historic, 
Spanish-Mexican  period  to  1848.  This  section  is  the  weakest. 
Navajo  locations  p.  30  and  31  are  not  correctly  given.  Pajanto 
should  read  Pajarito,  p.  26.  The  Apache  ranged  east  and 
northeast  far  beyond  the  Pecos  River.  Coronado  passed 
through  Zufii,  not  Hopi,  p.  28.  The  Comanche,  not  on  the 
plains  when  the  white  men  arrived  (p.  36)  emerged  from  the 
mountains  about  1700.  Unfortunately,  Professor  Hollon  has 


356  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

accepted  opinions,  still  widely  current,  of  white  men  who 
seized  Apache  lands.  The  chapter  devoted  to  the  Spaniards 
is  by  far  the  most  inadequate  in  the  book.  The  author  shows 
himself  unfamiliar  with  the  importance  Spain  attached  to 
New  Mexico,  then  including  Arizona,  founded  originally  as 
an  outpost  to  protect  northern  Mexico.  Its  internal  history 
in  the  seventeenth  century  developed  a  life  of  its  own  within 
which  the  Pueblo  Revolt  and  the  Re-Conquest  have  an  ex- 
planation, but  here  receive  no  significant  treatment.  The 
eighteenth  century  fares  fully  as  badly.  Although  he  presents 
a  competent  survey  of  the  approach  and  retreat  of  the  French 
in  the  Southwest,  he  missed  the  other  great  theme  of  the  cen- 
tury: Spanish-Indian  conflicts  that  ranged  from  the  Navajo 
attacks  upon  the  settlements  to  the  clash  of  the  Apache  and 
Comanche,  both  of  whom  bore  down  upon  Texan,  New  Mexi- 
can and  north  Mexican  settlements.  Their  range  of  destruc- 
tion was  so  great  that  the  Spanish  government  launched  a 
twenty-year  program  of  defense  that  had  a  significant  bear- 
ing upon  the  evolution  of  the  area.  All  this  history  remains 
a  closed  book,  however,  to  the  author,  and  accounts  for  his 
isolated  treatment  of  Kino  and  Garces.  Because  the  rest  of 
the  volume  is  done  with  such  excellence,  the  reviewer  hopes 
Professor  Hollon  will  bring,  on  revision,  the  earlier  part  up 
to  the  same  high  standard. 

The  second  party  of  the  study  covers  roughly  the  nine- 
teenth century.  Included  are  a  survey  of  American  expan- 
sion westward,  early  explorers,  the  growth  of  the  western 
fur  and  Santa  Fe  trade,  colonization  of  Texas,  and  the  trans- 
fer of  the  Five  Civilized  Tribes  to  Oklahoma.  His  account  of 
life  and  culture  in  Texas  is  absorbing.  The  chapter  surveying 
the  Mexican  War  presents  the  accepted  and  well-established 
facts,  i.e.  those  isolated  from  the  Mexican  side  of  the  story, 
of  the  American  winning  of  the  war  and  the  annexation  of 
southwest  territory  completed  with  the  Gadsden  Purchase. 
The  simultaneous  acquisition  of  California  and  the  discovery 
of  gold  there  opened  the  way  for  overland  trails.  Here  the 
author  shows  the  effect  of  this  movement  upon  population 
growth  in  the  Southwest  and  the  effort  to  develop  communi- 
cations by  coaches  and  camels.  He  makes  effective  use  of  the 


BOOK  REVIEWS  357 

struggle  for  communications  both  as  a  factor  in  Southwest- 
ern development,  and  as  an  element  in  the  sectional  conflict  in 
the  nation.  His  treatment  of  the  Civil  War  in  the  Southwest 
is  competent,  dealing-  with  the  chief  efforts  of  the  Confed- 
erates to  occupy  New  Mexico  and  Arizona,  and  the  attitude 
of  the  Five  Civilized  Tribes  toward  the  struggle.  Missing  is 
any  reference  to  the  changing  of  the  northern  New  Mexico 
boundary  in  1861,  the  evacuation  of  Fort  Stanton,  and  the 
efforts  of  the  Confederate  agents  to  win  the  Comanche  as 
allies.  The  nineteenth  century  is  completed  with  a  survey  of 
events  leading  Oklahoma,  Arizona  and  New  Mexico  to  state- 
hood, and  an  account  of  the  changing  Indian.  Here  it  should 
be  noted  that  his  treatment  of  the  Indian's  relation  to  South- 
western history  is  episodical.  He  makes  no  effort,  nor  does 
anyone  else  for  that  matter,  to  view  the  Indian  in  relation  to 
the  historical  process  in  the  area.  He  gives  a  good  account  of 
the  well-known  facts  of  the  reservation  system  and  present 
day  condition  among  the  Pueblos,  and  occasionally  hints  at 
the  rapacity  of  the  whites  in  seizing  Indian  lands.  But  he  falls 
back  upon  the  usual  interpretation  when  he  notes  that  In- 
dians used  agents'  headquarters  as  feeding  stations  between 
raids,  but  makes  no  mention  of  the  incessant  Indian  plea, 
principally  Apache,  for  lands  to  cultivate. 

Outstanding  is  Professor  Hollon's  survey  of  Southwest- 
ern development  in  the  twentieth  century.  The  chapter  on 
Desert  and  Oasis  pinpoints  the  critical  importance  of  water 
for  the  present  and  future  of  the  area,  and  contains  Webb's 
too  little  known  thesis  of  conserving  water  in  the  vast  Texas 
area.  With  the  possibility  of  water  shortage  looming,  Hollon 
next  examines  the  fabulous  industrial  boom  which  has  con- 
verted the  Southwest  from  an  agrarian,  rural  economy  to  an 
urban  one.  Hollon  is  due  for  special  praise  here,  also  true  for 
his  later  chapters,  for  his  detailed  and  extensive  research. 
Here  he  has  broken  new  ground  but  his  firm  grip  on  a  huge 
range  of  data  on  population  change,  industrial  statistics,  and 
state  and  national  policies  for  the  four  states,  enables  him 
to  write  both  with  absorbing  interest  and  paint  an  extra- 
ordinarily clear  picture  of  the  present  Southwest.  Following 
this  excellent  study  of  the  economy  are  two  priceless  chap- 


358  NEW   MEXICO   HISTORICAL  REVIEW 

ters  on  Southwestern  politics  which  embrace,  for  Texas  and 
Oklahoma,  such  characters  as  the  Fergusons  and  O' Daniel  in 
Texas,  and  Murray  in  Oklahoma.  For  New  Mexico  he  clari- 
fies the  patron  system  which  Bronson  Cutting  dominated  so 
effectively.  For  Arizona  Hollon  shows  that  the  spectacular 
boom  brought  forward  in  that  usually  democratic  state  a  fig- 
ure, not  on  the  low  level  as  the  howling  O'Daniel  of  Texas  for 
example,  but  a  conservative  Republican  trumpeting  lamenta- 
tions— Barry  Goldwater.  Those  interested  will  find  in  these 
two  chapters  a  sound  explanation  why  two  of  these  four  nor- 
mally democratic  states  voted  Republican  in  1960. 

Turning  his  attention  to  Southwestern  culture,  Hollon 
provides  an  excellent  view,  for  the  four  states,  of  the  status 
of  education,  the  contributions  of  the  universities  and  their 
presses,  Southwestern  interest  in  Indian  art  and  the  theatre, 
and  the  literary  achievements  of  poets,  writers  and  histor- 
ians, with  especial  emphasis  upon  Dobie  and  Webb  in  Texas. 
His  final  chapters  on  Cities  and  Culture  bring  out  the  factors 
that  have  contributed  to  the  phenomenal  growth  of,  among 
others,  Albuquerque,  Phoenix,  Oklahoma  City,  Tulsa,  Hous- 
ton, Dallas,  Fort  Worth,  and  San  Antonio.  Throughout,  the 
contribution  of  the  United  States  government  in  scattering 
its  defense  plants  is  apparent,  and  plaguing  these  new  metro- 
politan areas  are  problems  of  transportation  and  water 
supply. 

With  two  exceptions  noted  below,  Professor  Hollon  has 
written  an  outstanding  survey  of  the  major  developments  in- 
fluencing the  history  of  the  Southwest.  The  weaknesses  of  the 
book  are  in  this  reviewer's  opinion,  an  inadequate  presenta- 
tion of  (1)  the  main  lines  of  colonial  development  and  the 
positive  contributions  of  Spain  to  the  Southwest ;  and  (2)  the 
role  of  the  Indian  as  a  factor  in  the  area's  history  up  to  the 
end  of  the  nineteenth  century.  While  Professor  Hollon  is  not 
obligated  to  present  conclusions,  this  reviewer  believes  he 
would  strengthen  his  work  if  he  would  note  briefly  what  he 
thinks  are  the  main  lines  of  evolution  in  the  Southwest,  and 
the  relations  of  its  recent  phenomenal  development  to  the 
nation  as  a  whole. 

University  of  Alabama  ALFRED  B.  THOMAS 


INDEX 


Adobe  Walls,   battle    (1864),   47 

A  Guide  to  ...  New  Mexico  Land  Grants, 

by  Diaz,  rev'd.,  74 
Apache   depredation,    5 ;   see   Nellie   Brown 

Powers,  89 

Archiveque,  Sostenes,  80 
Armijo,  Sheriff  Perfecto,  80 
Arms  embargo,  Mexico   (1912),  112 
Armstrong,  A.  F.  H.,  "The  Case  of  Major 

Isaac  Lynde,"  1-35 
Ashenfelter,  S.  M.,  187 
Athern,    Robert   G.,    rev.,    Mattes,    Indians, 

Infants  and  Infantry  ....  245 

Barrera,  Miguel,  81 

Beck,  Preston  Jr.,  146 

Benavides,  Santos,  80 

Bennett,  H.  C.,  181 

Bernal,  Sergeant  Mariano  (1815),  265 

Berthould,  Bartholomew,  267 

Big  Horn,  battle,  257 

Billy  the  Kid,  80 

Bond,  Frank,  see  Frank  H.  Grubbs 

Bonneville,  Col.  B.  L.  E.,  42 

Bonney,  William  (Billy  the  Kid),  80 

Bookhamer,  B.  F.,  307 

Brazito,  battlefield,  87 

Breeden,  William,  185 

"British  Investment  and  the  American  Min- 
ing Frontier,  1860-1914,"  by  Spence,  121- 
137 

Brown,  Darius,  89 

Brown,  Fred,  89 

Brown,  Henry,  89 

Brown,  Mrs.  Henry  (Sally  Ann),  89 

Brown,  Sally  Ann  (Mrs.  Henry  Brown),  89 

Browne,  James,  38 

Burke,  W.  S.,  182ff 

Business  Management  (1900's),  292f 

Butscher,  L.  C.,  285 

Cabra  Springs,  147,  231 

Cahuilla  Indians,  74 

Campbell,  Robert,  51 

Camp  Nichols,  48 

Canby,  Col.  E.  R.  S.,  2,  44 

Carleton,  Capt.  James  H.,  41 

Carlisle,  A.,  cattleman,  199 

Carranza,  Venustiano,  rebel,  107 

Carson,  Lt.  Col.  Christopher,  45 

Catron,  Charles  C.,  315 

Catron,  Thomas  B.,  185 

Cattle-sheep  conflict,  198 

Chapman,  Major  William,  44 

Chavez,  J.  Francisco,  185ff 

Cheyenne,  see  Paul  Goodbear 

Cheyenne  Sun  Dance,  259 

Childers,  W.  B.,  188 

Chittenden,  T.  G.,  324 

Chouteau,  Auguste  P.,  263ff 

Chouteau-Demun  expedition,  by  Ulibarri,  263 

Chouteau,  Peter,  267 


Christiansen,  Paige  W.,  "Pascual  Orozco : 

Chihuahua  Rebel,"  97-120 
Cisco  Spring,  163 

Ciudad  Juarez,  rebels  (1911),  104ff 
Civil  War,  1-36 
Clifton,  Arizona,  85 
Clymer,  Joseph,  38 
Cochran,  Earl,  302 
Colquhoun,  James,  The  Early  History  of  the 

Clifton-Morenci  District,  85 
Connell,  Walter,  288 
Cook,  Grove,  56 

Coronado  Monument,  mural,  257 
Cressy,  Dr.  Edward  F.,  26  note 
Crilly,  Lt.  Francis  J.,  biog.,  13 
Crittenden,  Lt.  Col.  George  B.,  43 
Crutchett,  Isabel  Powers,  96 
CT  Ranch,  162 
Cuervo,  village,  232 
Curran,  J.  E.,  editor,  201 

Dargan,  Marion,  mention,  177 

Davenport,  Clarence  E.,  323 

Davenport,  John,  283 

Davis,  George,  80 

Demun,  Julius,  263ff,  347 

Diaz,  Albert  James,  A  Guide  to  the  Micro- 
film of  Papers  relating  to  New  Mexico 
Land  Grants,  rev'd.,  74 

Dillon,  Richard  C.,  338 

Doll,  Charles  E.,  278 

Dorsey,  Stephen  W.,  179 

Dun  Company,  R.  G.,  280 

Duncan,  Capt.  Thomas,  45 

Dunn,  John,  327 

Easton,  Capt.  L.  C.,  87 

Eaton,  H.  S.,  289 

"Edmund  G.  Ross  .  .  .  ,"  by  Lamar,  177-209 

El  Combate,  newspaper,  Wagonmound,  301 

End  of  Track,  by  Kyner,  rev'd.,  252 

Espanola  Mercantile  Company,  277 

Espinosa,    Jose    E.,    Saints   in    the    Valleys, 

rev'd.,  36:333 
Esteros  Lake,  146 
Esteros  Ranch,  146 
Eurindian,  346 

Fairview,  95 

Fauntleroy,  Col.  Thomas  T.,  43 

Feather,  A.  G.,  re  German  Jews,  87 ;  letter 
re  Bracito,  87 

Fitzpatrick,  Lilian  L.,  Nebraska  Place 
Names,  rev'd.,  851 

Floersheim  Mercantile  Company,  322 

Floyd,  Troy  S.,  rev.,  Sherman  and  Green- 
leaf,  Victoria/no  Huerta,  246 

Forbes,  Jack  D.,  rev.,  James,  Cahuilla  In- 
dians, 74,  347 

Forbes  Wool  Company,  317 

Fort  Barclay,  161 


359 


360 


NEW    MEXICO    HISTORICAL   REVIEW 


Fort  Butler.  169 

Fort  Fillmore,  2 

Fort  Lyon  (Colorado),  46.  See  Fort  Wise 

Fort  McLane,  3 

"Fort  Union  and  the  Santa  Fe  Trail,"  by 

Utley,  36-48 

Fort  Wise,  40.  See  Fort  Lyon 
Forty  Years  Among  the  Indiana,  by  Jones, 

rev'd.,  72 

Fox,  George  W.,  188 
Frankenburger,  F.  R.,  309 
Freighting  (1850's),  36f 
Fremont's  Fourth  Expedition,   eds.,    Hafen 

and  Hafen,  rev'd.,  77 
Freudenthal,  L.  E.,  letters,  84 
Frost,  Col.  Max,  179 
Frost,    Donald    McKay,    Notes    on    General 

Ashley    the     Overland     Trail    and    South 

Pass,  rev'd.,  72 

Gable,  Thomas  P.,  warden,  191 

Gallegos,  J.  D.,  138 

Garland,  A.  H.,  U.  S.  Att.  Gen.,  192 

Garland,  Col.  John,  42 

Garmon,  Bill,  49 

Garrett,  Pat.,  80 

Geis,  F.  A.,  282 

German  Jews,  notes,  84 

"Geronimo,  the  Apache,"  by  Powers,  89-96 

Gibbs,  Capt.  Alfred,  biog.,  22  note 

Gildersleeve,  C.  H.,  186 

Glanz,  Rudolf,  The  Jews  of  California  from 
the  Discovery  of  Gold  until  1880,  rev'd., 
244 

Gomez,  Emilio  Vasquez,  rebel,  109 

Gonzales,  George,  148 

Goodbear,  Paul  F.  E.,  257,  349 

Gray's  Ranch,  Purgatory  River,  46 

Greenleaf,  Richard  E.,  rev.,  Perrigo,  Our 
Spanish  Southwest,  76 

Greever,  William  S.,  rev.,  Kyner,  End  of 
Track,  252 

Gressley,  Gene  M.,  rev.,  Fitzpatrick,  Nebras- 
ka Place  Names,  351 

Gross,  Jacob,  821 

Grubbs,  Frank  H.,  "Frank  Bond :  Gentleman 
Sheepherder  of  Northern  New  Mexico 
1883-1915,"  138-158,  230-243,  274-345 

Guizarn^tegui,  Francisco  de.  Chihuahua 
merchant,  216ff 

Gusdorf,  Alexander,  325 

Gusdorf,  Melvin  (death),  326 

Hafen,  LeRoy  R.  and  Ann  W.  Hafen,  eds., 
Fremont's  Fourth  Expedition,  rev'd.,  77 

Hall,  Martin  Hardwick,  Sibley's  New  Mex- 
ico Campaign,  rev'd.,  73 

Hamblett,  Lee,  200 

Hand,  J.  D.,  147 

Harris,  Benjamin  Butler,  The  Gila  Trail: 
The  Texas  Argonauts  and  the  California 
Gold  Rush,  rev'd.,  250 

Hazeldine,  William  C.,  182 

Hereford,  Frances  S.  (Mrs.  Sublette),  54,  59 

Hereford,  Thomas,  59 

Hersch,  Leo,  275 


Heuten,  J.  P.  Van.  819 

Hewett,  Dr.  Edgar  L.,  re  Lew  Wallace,  62 

Highway  improvement,  39 

Hill,  Milo.  311 

Holbrook,  Joe,  Jr.,  234 

Hollon,  W.  Eugene,  rev.,  Hafen  and  Hafen, 
eds.,  Fremont's  Fourth  Expedition,  77 

Horse  thieves,  80 

Horse  trade,  Calif..  56 

Huddleson,  J.  C.,  318 

Huerta,  Victoriano,  112 

Huling,  E.  J.,  318 

Huning,  Franz,  182 

Hunt,  Aurora,  Kirby  Benedict,  Frontier  Fed- 
eral Judge,  rev'd.,  350 

Indian,  art,  257f ;  74  ;  see  Paul  Goodbear 
Indians,  Infants  and  Infantry  .  .  .  ,  by  Mat- 
tes, rev'd.,  245 

James,    Harry    C.,    The    Cahuilla    Indians, 

rev'd.,  74 
Jews,  notes,  84 
Jinglebob  Ranch,  171 
Johnson,  E.  A.,  281 
Jones,  Daniel  W.,  Forty  Years  Among  the 

Indians,  rev'd.,  72 
Joseph,  Antonio,  186 
Julian,  George  W.,  Surv.  Gen.,  189 

Keleher,  William  A.,  rev.,  Hunt,  Kirby 
Benedict  .  .  .  ,  350 ;  rev.,  McCubbin,  The 
Life  of  John  Wesley  Hardin  ....  78 

Kelly,  H.  W.,  319 

Kirby  Benedict,  Frontier  Federal  Judge,  by 
Hunt,  rev'd.,  350 

Kistler,  J.  A.,  205 

Kyner,  James  H.,  End  of  Track,  rev'd.,  252 

LaFarge,  Oliver,  quote  re  Lew  Wallace,  62 

Lamar,  Howard  R.,  "Edmund  G.  Ross  as 
Governor  of  New  Mexico  Territory :  a  Re- 
appraisal," 177-209 ;  rev.,  Pearson,  Max- 
well Land  Grant,  253 

Land  claims,  court  of,  197 

Land  grant,  Trampas,  305 

Lane,  George  W.,  Terr.  Sec.,  177 

Laughlin,  Napoleon  B.,  193 

Leavenworth,  E.  S.,  284 

Lee,  Harry  F.,  287 

Leidesdorff,  William  A.,  56 

Leiva,  Mariano,  81 

"Lew  Wallace's  Ben  Hur,"  by  Towne,  62 

Lieuwen,  Edwin,  rev.,  Quirk,  The  Mexican 
Revolution:  19H-1S1S,  70 

Living  improvement  (1910's),  298 

Long,  A.  H.,  231,  294 

Long,  Judge  Elisha  V.,  189 

Lopez,  Antonio,  285 

Lucero,  Alfredo,  280 

Lumbering,  306 

Luna,  Solomon  F.,  287 

Lynde,  Capt.  F.  Marcy,  84 

Lynde,  Major  Isaac,  1-35 

MacArthur,  Archibald,  company,  188 


INDEX 


361 


McCarthy.  Justin  H.,  292,  326 

McCarthy,  T.  G.,  326 

McClure,  Will,  154 

McCubbin,  Robert  G.,  The  Life  of  John  Wes- 
ley Hardin  as  Written  by  Himself,  rev'd., 
78 

McKee,  Major  James  Cooper,  surgeon,  4ff ; 
Narrative  of  .  .  .  Surrender  .  .  .  Fort  Fill- 
more  ....  rev'd.,  73 

McNally,  Lt.  Christopher  Hely,  biog.,  18  note 

Madero,  Francisco,  rebel,  104 

Maes,  Juanito,  80 

Mail  service  (1850's),  41  note;  military  pro- 
tection, 42 

Major,  Alexander,  38 

Map,  Pike's,  266,  347 

Marmon,  Walter  G.,  204 

Martines,  Jose  Leandro,  274 

Martinez,  Capt.  Felix,  211 

Martinez,  Romulo,  U.  S.  Marshal,  189 

Mattes,  Merrill  J.,  Indiana,  Infanta  and  In- 
fantry :  Andrew  and  Elizabeth  Burt  on  the 
Frontier,  rev'd.,  245 

Mesilla  (village),  2;  Times,  quoted  re  Civil 
War,  11 

Mexican,  rebels  (1900's),  95  passim;  settle- 
ments (1900's),  98ff 

Mexico,  arms  embargo  (1912),  112;  revolu- 
tion (1911),  97 

Miera,  Pantaleon,  80 

Military  protection,  1851-1865  ;  41ff 

Mills,  M.  W.,  Dist.  Attor.,  201 

Mills,  William  Wallace,  3 

Mining,  85  ;  investments,  121 ;  method,  128 

Moore,  Judge,  92 

Moorhead,  Max  L.,  "The  Presidio  Supply 
Problem  of  New  Mexico  in  the  Eighteenth 
Century,"  210-229 

Morenci,  Arizona,  85 

Mountain  men,  263ff 

Munroe,  Col.  John,  37 

Mural,  Coronado  Monument,  257 ;  Hilton 
Hotel  (Albuquerque),  259 

Narrative  of  .  .  .  Surrender  .  .  .  Fort  Fill- 
more  .  .  .  ,  by  McKee,  rev'd.,  73 

Nebraska  Place  Names,  by  Fitzpatrick, 
rev'd.,  351 

Newspapers,  177-209  passim;  301 

Nicholas,  Alejandro,  281 

Nohl,  Louis  F.,  274 

Notes  on  General  Ashley  the  Overland  Trail 
and  South  Pass,  by  Frost,  rev'd.,  72 

Orozco,   Pascual,  Chihuahua  Rebel,  97 
Ortiz,  Jose,  merchant  (1780's),  221 
Ortiz  y  Salazar,  Antonio,  Terr.  Treas.,  192 
Otero,    Pedro,    merchant    (1700's),    211 
Our  Spanish  Southwest,  by  Perrigo,  rev'd., 
76 

Palen,  R.  J.,  309 
Paltenghe,  Alex,  140 
Paltenghe,  Manuel,  140 
Papanaugh,  94 

Parish,  William  J.,  rev.,  Rudolf  Glanz,  The 
Jews  of  California  .  .  .  ,  244 


Parke,  Lt.  John  G.,  87 

Partidario,  138,  142 

Pasamonte,  167 

"Paul  'Flying  Eagle'  Goodbear,"  by  Thorn- 
burgh,  257-262 

Pearson,  Jim  Berry,  The  Maxwell  Land 
Grant,  rev'd.,  253 

Perez,  Santa  Ana,  Mexican  rebel,  98 

Perrigo,  Lynn  I.,  Our  Spanish  Southwest, 
rev'd.,  76 ;  comments,  175 

Pettingell,  R.  C.,  349 

Pfeiffer,  Maj.  Albert  H.,  48 

Phillibert,  Mountain  man,  264 

Pike,  Zebulon,  map,  266,  347 

Piano,  89 

Pino,  Juan  Estevan,  146 

Pollard,  C.  L.,  148,  282,  303 

Pope,  Lt.  John,  39 

Posha,  Henry,  243 

Potosi,  Plan  of  San  Luis,  99 

Potter,  Col.  Charles  S.,  murder,  80 

Powers,  Nellie  Brown,  "A  Ride  from  Geron- 
imo,  the  Apache,"  89-96 

Prager,  W.  S.,  287 

Prices  (1915),  276 

Presidial  wages,  210ff 

Presidio,  see  Max  L.  Moorhead 

Provencher,  Dumas,  death,  204 

Provost,  Etienne,  272 

Quintana,  Joe,  282 

Quirk,  Robert  F.,  The  Mexican  Revolution: 
1914-1915,  rev'd.,  70 

Race  fusion,  346 

Ranch,  Adobe,  94  ;  Double  Spring,  89  ;  N-Bar, 
90:101,  166 

Range  conflict,  198 

Read,  Benjamin  M.,  281 

Rebels,  Mexican  (1900's),  95  passim 

Reeve,  Frank  D.,  rev.,  Diaz,  A  Guide  to  ... 
New  Mexico  Land  Grants,  74 ;  rev.,  Frost, 
Notes  on  General  Ashley  ....  72  ;  rev., 
Hall,  Sibley's  New  Mexican  Campaign,  73  ; 
rev.,  Jones,  Forty  Years  Among  the  In- 
dians, 72 ;  rev.,  McKee,  Narrative  of  .  .  . 
Surrender  .  .  .  Fort  Fillmore  ...  73  ;  rev., 
Winfrey  et  al.,  eds.,  Texas  Indian  Papers 
1825-1843,  71 

Reeves,  Reuben  A.,   189 

Renehan,  A.  B.,  282 

Reynolds,  C.  B.,  288 

Roberts,  Col.  Benjamin  S.,  9  note 

Robb,  J.  D.,  rev.,  Espinosa,  Saints  in  the  Val- 
ley, 36.333 

Robinson,  J.  H.,  330 

Rodeo,  1914,  160 

Ross,  Gov.  Edmund  G.,  177-209 

Ross,  W.  A.,  314 

Roundup  (1914),  160 

Roupe,  Stephen,  200 

Roy,  founded,  148 

Roy,  William  and  Frank,  148 

Ruhlen,  George,  letter  re  Bracito,  87 

Russell,  H.  M.,  289 

Russell,  William  H.,  38 


362 


NEW    MEXICO    HISTORICAL   REVIEW 


Rynerson,  William  F.,  185 

Saints    in    the    Valley   by    Espinosa,    rev'd., 

86 :333 

Saisy  (Saify),  John  B.,  272 
Santa  Fe  trail,  36f 
Santo  Tomas,  5 
Sargent,  Ed,  285 
Scheurich,  Charles  A.,  835 
Schmidt,  John  Justus,  138 
Schnaufer,  F.  W.,  298 
Schomburg,  T.  A.,  316 
Schools,  est.  public,  183 
Scott,  W.  C.,  289 
Seligman,  Adolf,  281 
Sheep,  cattle  conflict,  198  ;  disease,  286  ;  feed 

lots,  141 

Sherman,  William  L.  and  Richard  E.  Green- 
leaf,  Victoria.ru>  Huerta:  A  Reappraisal, 

rev'd.,  246 
Sibley's  New  Mexican  Campaign,  by  Hall, 

rev'd.,  73 
Smith,  Fred,  49 
Smith,  Hank,  Civil  War,  19 
Smith,  William,  81 
"Solomon  Perry  Sublette:  Mountain  Man  of 

the  Forties,"  by  Sunder,  49-61 
Spence,  Clark  C.,   "British  Investment  and 

the  American  Mining  Frontier,  1860-1914," 

121-137 

Springer,  Frank,  201 
Staab,  A.,  325 
Stage  coach  (1850's),  41 
Stearns,  C.  H.,  240 
Stephens,  E.  L.,  "West  of  the  Pecos,"  159- 

174 

Stewart,  Sir  William  Drnmmond,  53 
Stover,  Elias  Sleeper,  182ff 
Sublette,  Capt.  Andrew  W.,  49  note 
Sublette,  Esther  Frances,  60 
Sublette,  (Mrs.  Frances  S.  Hereford),  54,  59 
Sublette,  Milton,  49 
Sublette,  Solomon,  49 
Sublette,  Solomon  Perry,  Jr.,  59 
Sublette,  William,  49 
Sublette,  William  Hugh,  60 
Sumner,  CoL  Edwin  V.,  37 
Sun  Dance,  Cheyenne,  259 
Sunder,  John  E.,  "Solomon  Perry  Sublette: 

Mountain  Man  of  the  Forties,"  49-61 

Taos  Mercantile  Company,  332 

Texas  Indian  Papers  1825-1847,  ed.  by  Win- 
frey et  al.,  rev'd.,  71 

The  Cahuilla  Indians,  by  James,  rev'd.,  74 

"The  Case  of  Major  Isaac  Lynde,"  by  Arm- 
strong, 1-35 

The  Gilo,  Trail  ....  by  Harris,  rev'd.,  250 

The  Jews  of  California  .  .  .  ,  by  Glanz,  rev'd., 
244 

The  Life  of  John  Wesley  Hardin  ....  by 
McCubbin,  rev'd.,  78 


The  Maxwell  Land  Grant,  by  Pearson,  rev'd., 

253 
The     Mexican    Revolution:     1914-1915,     by 

Quirk,  rev'd.,  70 
"The  Presidio  Supply  Problem   .   .   .   ,"  by 

Moorhead,  210-229 
Thompson,  Jesse  E.,  schoolman,  201 
Thornburgh,    Luella,    "Paul    'Flying    Eagle' 

Goodbear,"  257-262 
Thornton,  William  T.,  186 
Towne,    Jackson    E.,    "Lew    Wallace's    Ben 

Hur,"  62 
Traders,  263ff 
Trampas,  land  grant,  305 
Transportation  costs,  1780's,  217 
Trappers,  49 
Trimble,  L.  S.,  187 
Truchas  Lumber  Company,  306 
True,  Clara  D.,  283 
Trujillo,  Ranch,  146 
Turkey  Legs,  Cheyenne  Chief,  257 
Turley,  Walter  G.,  317 

Ulibarri,  George  S.,  "The  Chouteau-Demun 
Expedition  to  New  Mexico,  1815-17," 
263-273 

Utley,  Robert  M.,  "Fort  Union  and  the 
Santa  Fe  Trail,"  36-48. 

Valdez,  Constable  Pedro,  80 

Vasquez,  Louis,  53 

Victoriano  Huerta  ...»  by  Sherman  and 

Greenleaf,  rev'd.,  246 
Villa,  Francisco,  rebel,  100 
Vincent,  William  A.,  189 
Vorenberg,  Simon,  149 
VS  Ranch,  172 

Wade,  E.  C.,  Dist.  Attor.,  193 

Waldo,  David,  38 

Waldo,  Judge  Henry  L.,  186 

Walett,  France  G.,  letters,  82 

Walker,  Joseph  Reddeford,  56 

Wallace,  Lew,  Ben  Hur,  62  ;  death,  67 

Warren,  Henry  L.,  195 

Warshauer,  Fred,  284 

Webb,  John  J.,  80 

Westphall,  Victor,  rev.,  Butler,  The  Gila 
Trail ....  250 

Whirlwind,  Cheyenne  Chief,  257 

Wiest,  Andrew  W.,  145ff,  231 

Willis,  R.  M.,  280 

Wilson,  G.  M.,  81 

Wilson,  William,  murderer,  200 

Winfrey,  Dorman  H.  et  al.,  eds.,  Texas  In- 
dian Papers  1825-1843,  rev'd.,  71 

Wolcott,   Senator  Edward  Oliver,   82 

Wolcott,  Henry,  83 

Zapata,  Emiliano,  rebel,  109 


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